Ginny Potter and The Boy Who Lived
by rumpelsnorcack
Summary: Sequel to Ginny Weasley and The Boy Who Lived. It's probably not necessary to read that one first, as it follows canon pretty thoroughly. But this one does refer to made up scenes in that one from time to time.
1. Prologue: The First Month

_A/N: This is the sequel to Ginny Weasley and The Boy Who Lived. My intention is to be a bit more regular with updates on this one, so a new chapter should be posted once a week at about this time._

**Prologue: The First Month**

I've been reading back on my last memoir and have realised one slightly disturbing thing. It all ends nice and pat with a happy ever after and Harry and I snogging our way into the sunset at our wedding. Of course, that isn't at all the way it really was. Nothing is as easy as I made it look in the last two chapters of that work. It would have been nice, but life is never that wonderful. There were several loose ends hanging there as well. That's an unforgivable blunder for any writer, and most particularly for one who is detailing a life as famous as mine ended up. But I'll say more on that particular train of thought later.

It was most unfair that I allowed you guys to think that between the moment where we fell asleep after the battle at Hogwarts and our wedding that it was pretty much plain sailing. No life is that stress-free, and ours was no exception. Though, I guess those of you who have followed the press about Harry and I know already know some of these ups and downs. For those who haven't seen it all (where have you been? Under a rock?), or those who want those extra behind the scenes details, this is the memoir for you.

OK, let's first tie up some of those loose ends I left hanging with such disregard for closure and detail. For one thing, the fuss Mum made the morning after the battle was epic in scope and scale. I suspect she was using righteous indignation to cover her grief, but it was still rather uncomfortable to live through her vocal horror at our being discovered sleeping together.

That was, of course, all we had been doing. Neither of us was emotionally or physically up to anything more that day, but Mum seemed to think she'd been operating a bordello in her living room. Looking back now, I find it quite amusing, but at the time it was mortifying. Poor Harry had been through so much, and after the intense heart to heart we'd had that night about the horcruxes he should have had a warm welcome to the family. But as we all know, my mum is a lioness and very protective of her only baby girl. I had thought that would extend to only battles and such like, but apparently not.

Oh, don't get me wrong, she loved Harry, wanted us married more than anything, and was romantically delighted that we were together. But that delight didn't extend to sharing just one bed. In that particular way she was very old fashioned. Thankfully, Dad was around to calm her down, and explain that we weren't doing anything. Of course, he also took Harry aside and gave him the Weasley family 'talk' about appropriate behaviour.

Poor Harry endured it as best he could, but the simultaneous approval and disapproval from several members of my family confused and upset him. He had lived so long with the Dursleys making him think that everything he did was wrong, and even in the wizarding world, he had been repeatedly attacked for things he'd had no part in, or control over. But through it all, the one constant had been that my family, particularly Mum, had been welcoming and nurturing, loving him warts and all and never once questioning his integrity.

Now, he was still being treated as that beloved surrogate son, but as a beloved son who could explode and 'ruin' their daughter at any moment. I'm absolutely certain Mum had no idea what she was doing to him. For one thing, he hid his feelings pretty well, but I could tell. And for another, she was treating him exactly the way she would treat her own sons if they looked like they were ... er ... entertaining young ladies in the house. She didn't know, couldn't know because he was never that open about it, how bad things had been for Harry at that house he grew up in. Also, she was in the very fresh stages of grief and wasn't rational. Otherwise, I'm sure she would have at least noticed the effects on Harry and explained to him better the family dynamics that were at play here. Instead, that fell to me.

I took him away from the scene as fast as I could, dragging him out to the far reaches of the garden. Harry was coiled into himself, nothing remaining of that unburdened person I had woken to see in Gryffindor Tower. His jaw was clenched and there was tension written all over his body. He had come with me willingly enough, but was standing as far from me as he could, half-turned away. Looking at him, I sighed. I guessed this thing wasn't going to be as easy or as perfect as I had hoped last night. Without the freeing peace of the night we had been tugged away from each other yet again.

As I would have to on numerous occasions in the days and years to come, I reached out to him, using touch to break through to him. He flinched as my hand brushed his arm, but he didn't pull away. He was exhibiting a curious mix of wanting to be with me, and wanting to separate himself again to 'protect' me for my family. I curled my hand into his and pulled him down beside me on the ground. I didn't speak, preferring to allow him to come to it in his own time. He sat for a long time without moving, but still clinging to my hand as if it were the only anchor he had. Perhaps that was true. After an eternity, he spoke.

'Why? Why don't they want us together?'

My heart reached out to him. Was that really how he saw it? 'They do, Harry. They're just not ready to confront what that might mean ... one day.' I blushed as I said it. We'd had no time to explore that side of our relationship, either when we were together before Dumbledore died or in the months since then, and to be confronted with it so soon after we had found each other again ... well, I wasn't really ready for the whole situation either.

'No offense, Ginny, but I'm not ready myself. This last year has been too big, I've changed too much, to just go leaping into something like _that_ without knowing who I am first.'

Squashing down the irrational hurt I felt as he said it, I asked, 'Then why are you so upset by what Mum and Dad are doing?'

'I guess, because they think I would do that. They think I would come out of a battle literally for my _self_, and immediately ravish their daughter.'

'I don't think they do think that, not really. It's just a knee-jerk reaction for Mum, and Dad – well, Dad lived through raising Fr- Fred and George. '

Tears stung my eyes as I was brought up short by the casual way Fred had just slipped into the conversation, and the knowledge that he wasn't there loomed over me. I shook the thoughts out of my head and tried to continue as if I hadn't made the blunder.

'With those two, Dad's talk would have been needed. Anyway, they love you, you can't doubt that. Believe me, if any one of the boys had been found in a similar situation, Mum and Dad would have behaved in exactly the same way.'

Ron came out then, with Hermione trailing in his wake. He had that look of 'Mum's sent me to do something, so I'd better do it' on his face. Beside me, Harry stiffened. He had become almost at ease while we talked, but now he dropped my hand and shuffled as if trying to put some distance between us. I rolled my eyes, and squinted up at Ron.

Exuding awkwardness, Ron sat down with us, and began to make banal small talk. Hermione slid down beside him and made a better go at casual conversation. Harry remained awkward and unsure of himself, and the conversation was a disaster. I decided to tackle the thing head-on.

'You two,' I pointed at Ron and Hermione, 'were sent out here by Mum to keep an eye on us, weren't you?'

Ron cast a furtive look at Harry, and nodded.

'You do realise there's no need? And unless you all want to be hexed til next century, you'll give me and Harry _some_ time alone.'

'We know, Ginny,' said Hermione. ' But ... well, you know your mum. When she gets insistent, she never lets up 'til you do what she asked. It was easier to come out here than have her haranguing us.'

I sighed. How were Harry and I ever to get to know each other, and ourselves, if we constantly had Mum's guard dogs on our heels? We hadn't even been doing anything, but I knew Mum well enough to know that wouldn't matter. The idea was in her head now, and I was not of age and couldn't tell her to mind her own business – yet. Everyone was hurting so much, the realities of the day before hadn't sunk in properly, so I pushed the thought aside. I hoped that in the days to come, and Mum saw the way Harry and I interacted, that she would call off the dogs and that things would settle down.

I thought then, and I still think now, that Mum focussed onto one thing she could control in all of the mess that surrounded her. She couldn't control her feelings over Fred, or Lupin or Tonks. She couldn't control poor George's grieving process, or those of any of the rest of us. But she could control our romantic lives, at least to an extent. I noticed that Ron and Hermione came in for similar attentions. Over the next few days, the four of us were often sent on errands together, or told to go outside and relax, together.

True to my prediction, Mum wasn't keen to keep Harry and I apart, but she did want us chaperoned. Being with Ron and Hermione gave us a chance to do some mild snogging, but there was never a time when we could have the heart to heart talks I really wanted. We never got a chance to follow up on that horcrux talk. What was really important between us became impossible to talk about, and a gap began unintentionally to widen. Neither Harry nor I wanted to explore the details of being 'us' while with the others. I could sense some frustration coming off them too, and I bet they were feeling the same way.

After that first day, however, we all bit our lips and got on with it because underlying it all was the much more compelling grief everyone was feeling. George walked around all day looking lost and haunted, his absent ear always a vivid reminder of all we had lost. He was withdrawn and sad, any smile never reaching his dead eyes. The ghost of Fred seemed to whisper beside him, dampening all his energy and making every attempt at humour a mockery. Every time I saw him I would break in half again and though I tried to remain stoic, tears would sometimes slide down my cheeks as I retreated by myself to shed them in private.

Everyone has their own ways of dealing with grief, of course, and we were no exception. George tried, so hard, to be the jokester still, but it was grotesque. He didn't really feel 'funny' and only did it because he thought we expected it. Mum became rigid and controlling. She controlled everything from the housework and cooking, to what people did all day and on up to our relationships. Dad, poor Dad, was left to be the 'normal' one, the one to keep the family together, keep us functioning somehow despite the rigid new routines imposed on us. Harry retreated into himself, as he does, and after that first day stopped talking about the past with me. I was frustrated, but there was nothing I could do since we were so constantly timetabled and chaperoned.

A few days after the battle we held a private funeral in the back yard of the Burrow. George chose a spot that he and Fred had gone so often to have fun and make mischief. It was a dreadful day and a beautiful day. For the first time since I had apparated back here with Harry I allowed myself the luxury of crying in public. I clung to Harry, and he clung back. The festering pain in me was lanced a little and I could see that most of those around me felt the same. The grief was still there, but it was muted now. However, I could see that Mum and George were still broken, and I knew that only time could heal them. Over the coming weeks they learned to mask their raw grief, but I could always see it anyway, and every time I saw it I was cut through because I had caught myself enjoying time with Harry. The guilt I felt for not being steeped deep in grief was overwhelming every time it hit.

Thankfully, that didn't last very long and we found ourselves one Sunny day at the end of May being gathered up and sent back to Hogwarts to help with the rebuilding. Our time to grieve as a family was over. Now it was time to become part of the wider world again, and that meant emerging into the media circus that had arisen after the battle. Dad had put some sort of shield on the Burrow which meant that reporters, and thus the outside world, hadn't been able to intrude. However, that was over and we all knew it as we set off toward Hogwarts.


	2. Memories

**Rebuilding**

Chapter One: Memories.

When we returned to help with rebuilding the castle, we hadn't been able to apparate into the Hogwarts grounds themselves, as the wards had been put up again. So we found ourselves entering through the achingly familiar gates with the winged boars, and crossing the vast expanses of lawn in the approach to the castle. I had a firm grip on Harry's hand, but wasn't sure whether I was offering him comfort or seeking some from him. It was already obvious that this was going to be a very difficult time.

Ahead of us was a half-completed marble obelisk. In the sunlight streaming onto it, the lettering glittered. On one side was a paragraph which we could read as we got closer. Someone, probably Professor McGonagall, had put a lot of care into the wording. I choked a little as Hermione read it aloud.

_On May 2, 1998, against superior forces, the defenders of Hogwarts fought bravely, and many gave their lives in the desperate battle to defeat the dark wizard known as Voldemort. Led by Harry Potter, the defenders were ultimately successful, but at great price. The names of all those who fell at this school in the lead up to the defeat of Voldemort are engraved on this stone to remind everyone of the sacrifices made by students and associates of Hogwarts to eliminate evil. We will never forget._

The first name on the second side was Cedric Diggory. I reached out to it, remembering the more innocent time before his death, back to the time when I was still worried about boys and schoolwork. I wished with all my heart that we could all return to those days, but I still understood that this tribute was necessary. All future students at this school would see and remember it every time they entered the gates. I cast my eye up towards the castle and realised the site would be easily visible from this side of the castle as well. There had been considerable thought put into the placement of the memorial. No-one would be able to ignore what had happened here.

While we had been standing there, communing with the past, Professor Flitwick had come down to meet us. He looked up at the unfinished top of the monument and said cheerfully, "We won't be finishing that off until the memorials have been held. It will be the finale of the services."

Dad nodded thoughtfully, and we all began the long walk up to the castle itself. As we walked, Flitwick outlined what had been done already to resurrect the castle. Even though it had been a month, no-one had been ready to rebuild until now. The grounds and the devastated castle had been something of a pilgrimage point for the thousands of wizarding families who wanted to see where it had ended. Now, however, the school needed to be repaired so that we could return this next year.

There were still sightseers, though. I could see scattered groups of them across the lawns, many of them starting to pay attention to us. I guessed our vivid Weasley hair was calling attention to us, and that most people were correctly guessing that Harry was with us. Professor Flitwick seemed to have come to the same conclusion because he quickened his steps as he led us towards the Entrance Hall. It seemed that curious wizards were being denied entry; only those who were here to help with the effort, and those who had lost loved ones that terrible day, were admitted to the castle itself.

Harry was clearly uncomfortable with the attention he was getting. We could hear snatches of the conversations as we entered the castle, and they were all along the lines of, 'Harry Potter ... that was him ... that's Potter.' The month we had spent at home, alone and grieving as a family, was about to give way to intense attention from the media and well wishers. I could see the tension in his face as he began to acknowledge that his role as 'the Chosen One' was not yet over.

We were ushered into the Great Hall, which was still the rubble-strewn, chaotic place it had been on the morning after the battle. People were still sitting haphazardly around the tables, and the teachers and Ministry people who were there to oversee the rebuilding were all at the top table. I shuddered, thinking back to the day of the battle and all that I had seen in this room, but I reminded myself that I needed to get used to this place again. This was going to be my home for the next year, and I had to feel comfortable here. I wished devoutly that the clean up would help me feel a sense of kinship here once more.

Harry squeezed my hand, and I drew comfort from being here with him. His face was still tense, and I could see him looking around in apprehension, wondering which of these people were going to harass him and try to bask in the 'Chosen One's' aura. However, we were instead gently welcomed by people who had been with us that day, and who didn't want or need to know the gory details. They just wanted to be together. It was an amazing sense of camaraderie.

I saw Luna across the Hall with her father, and had a sudden desire to see her. Even though we lived so close together, I hadn't seen her since the day of the battle. I was hit by the realisation that we had really insulated ourselves away for that month. Coming together again with this group of people who shared our grief and knew what it was like, was brilliant. I felt like our small family had expanded out, and I was now part of something bigger than myself. If I could have had the choice, of course I would prefer not to have gone through it. But it was oddly comforting to know that everyone here had been through the same thing and everyone here would be able to understand any grief that lingered while we resurrected the school.

I sat down next to Luna and her father. They were discussing the creatures that had infested the school during the battle, and how to get rid of them all. It was so familiar and Luna-like that I felt an immediate sense of peace just from being there. I stayed with them until I was called away by Dad to work out what my jobs would be in the coming days.

The next few days passed in something of a blur. We were simultaneously getting plans together to rebuild the school, and preparing for the memorial day for all of the fallen defenders. Everyone had already held personal funerals for each victim, but the world wanted to do something together, to mourn our losses and celebrate our victory together. So, almost exactly a month to the day after the battle, we all trooped down to the space around the obelisk. We had set up an astonishing number of seats for everyone who had expressed a desire to be at the service.

Harry was staring, his eyes fixed and haunted-looking, at the memorial itself. He clearly didn't want to catch anyone's eye, and we clung to each other's hands as we walked. However, when we got down to the spot, he was called away. Harry, as the person who had defeated Voldemort himself, was front and centre as the symbol for everything. He hated it, I could see it in his eyes, but he was carrying through with reasonable grace. I, however, felt bereft without him. Despite Mum's pretty successful attempts to keep us from being alone, we hadn't been apart much, except to sleep, since the day of the battle. I was still shaky and withdrawn from the loss of Fred, which still hit me at odd unexpected times, and the idea of going through this without Harry was terrifying.

There was no help for it, though. He was shepherded up to the platform that had been built, and I shuffled off to sit with Mum and Dad and the rest of my family. As family of one of those being remembered, we had been assigned seats near the front of the group, and were more visible than I would have liked. Mum, even though she can be a bit silly over ... well, silly things, was wonderful that day. She knew, she could tell, how I was feeling without Harry and without a word, she held me close and let me hide my tears in her chest whenever I wanted to.

All through the service, I could see him sitting there on the platform, white-lipped and tense, staring down at me with a hard expression in his eyes. He was still playing the blame game, I knew. He had this feeling that he was somehow to blame for all the deaths, that if he had only gone to Voldemort sooner, most of these people would not be mourned today. It was arrant nonsense, of course, and I hoped he would not call attention to those feelings. I let out a sigh of relief when he did his speech. He kept his bitter feelings about himself out of it, and just focussed on what had happened.

"Like everyone else has said, we're here today to remember the sacrifices of all those who died defending this castle. I wish ... I wish their sacrifices hadn't been necessary, but it was them who gave us the peace we all experience today. Every person who fought in the battle, in the several battles, for this castle, was instrumental in helping to defeat Voldemort."

The collective shudders that still ran through the crowd made him grin. It was a little twisted, a little smug, but it was one of the first genuine smiles I'd seen from him since he faced Voldemort in that final duel.

'He can't hurt us anymore, and his name has no more power, because of these people. Please, let us all take a moment to reflect on them while the Minister reads the names of all those who are gone.'

I saw him take a deep breath as he said it, and his eyes returned to mine. Strangely enough, he looked more at ease now. He hated being in the public eye, but I think that having been accepted, having had no-one attack him for being up there had drawn some of the tension out of him. He may have been blaming himself, but it was obvious that no-one else was, and while he looked a little baffled by all the love pouring over him, he was at least able to relax a little now.

As the last name on the memorial was read out, those on the platform came down and surrounded the obelisk, all raising their wands ready to complete the monument. Around me in the audience, I noticed many people raising their own wands to help. Soon, the jagged edges had disappeared and the obelisk looked as if it had been standing there for many years.

After a moment's silence, the crowd began to disperse and Harry came over to join us. He took my hand and we stayed there looking at the tributes that had been placed around the base of the monument. It was painful to read all the testimonies to Fred that were scattered among the others, but it was also fun in a weird way. So many of them were filled with laughter and reminiscences of his pranks and jokes that it was hard not to laugh. I glanced sideways at George. He had a small smile on his face as he read through them. Interestingly, Angelina Johnson, who had always been close to Fred, was right by George's side. I guessed it was nice that they could comfort each other, but I hoped neither was going to get hurt by the strong ties the other one had to the dead.

Our peace was once again shattered by the media; they became emboldened as most of the crowd slipped away. When I looked up, I found that we were surrounded by reporters and their equipment. Without acknowledging their presence, Harry tugged on my hand and we began to move away and off towards the apparition point outside the castle gates.

"Mr Potter, what will you do now that You-Know-Who is gone?" Harry's mouth twisted in condescension as the reporter couldn't bring himself to say Voldemort's name, even now.

"Harry! How does it feel to be the Chosen One and have nothing to do now?"

"Miss ... hey Miss! Are you dating Harry Potter? Is it his fame that you're after?"

The pressure from Harry's hand increased in mine, and he took larger strides as we made our way through the gates. I stole a glance up at him, and his eyes were burning with anger, but he refused to say anything. Taking my lead from him, even though I was desperate to hurl abuse at the bastards for even suggesting such a thing, I kept my silence until we reached the safety of the apparition point. One thing in all of this was very clear. Harry was as much the centre of attention he had always been, and now I was right there with him. It was a poor ending to a hard day, and the small peace we had attained was shattered as we apparated back to the Burrow.


	3. Resurrecting Hogwarts

_A/N I'd like to thank my beta, the wonderful Lorelaisquared, who keeps doing a sterling job in the face of my reckless misuse of commas. You're the best Squid, and I hope you know how much I appreciate all the help and support._

**Chapter Two: Resurrecting Hogwarts.**

An enterprising reporter followed us back to the Burrow, so now they knew where Harry was living, and a whole contingent of them set up reasonably permanent camp on the boundaries. Every time we wanted to apparate anywhere we had to go outside the wards Dad had set around the house, so we always had to run the gauntlet of the reporters when we headed off to help with the repairs of Hogwarts. Harry was besieged with questions every time, and even though he never once answered them, they refused to let up on the relentless pursuit of the 'story' about him.

We didn't let it affect what we were doing, though. Every day, the castle became slightly less ravaged. Every day it took on the shape of its old self, and for some reason that always made me feel a little maudlin. We were restoring the castle to what it had been, yes, and that was a wonderful thing. But we were also obliterating every sign of the battle that had claimed my brother's life. Every brick that sailed back into place, every ward that was strengthened, every window that knitted itself together, was wiping out a little more of the memory of that day. It finally became too much for me and I sought refuge from what we were doing.

Hermione found me first. I was sitting with my hands clasped around my knees, staring out at the lake. She sat down with me and gave me a quick hug. I was reminded of the day, which seemed so long ago, when she had hugged me as I cried over the knowledge that Harry was leaving me behind. I smiled and squeezed her back, already happier because I knew that those days were over, and at least I had Harry back with me, despite all the odds. She wasn't fooled, though.

"What's the matter, Ginny?"

"Nothing."

She gave me that Hermione look and I relented. "Ok, fine. It's just me being silly. I feel like we're going to wipe away everything that happened. That Fred, and Tonks and Lupin, and everyone else will be gone then. Truly gone, and it hurts to think that one day we'll be finished here and it will all be forgotten."

"But don't you see, their blood is deep within these walls. If we didn't rebuild, if we didn't try to make the world normal again, then that would mean they died in vain."

I shrugged, and she pulled on my arm, dragging me to my feet.

"I need to show you something. Or, actually, I think Harry does."

She refused to say another word until we were back in the castle and she had found Harry and Ron. They had been assigned to Gryffindor Tower, and I could hear them as we approached.

"I dunno, Harry. I don't think that ward needs to go back up."

"You might be right. I always thought it was particularly unfair. Why should girls be allowed in the boys' rooms but boys not be allowed in the girls'?"

"I think we should leave it. Let the new generations of boys work it out for themselves, though."

I snorted, unable to help myself. Being with them here, seeing Harry so carefree for once, did make it seem worthwhile. They spun around at the sound, however, Ron going brightest Weasley red and Harry a sickly pale green. Both wore identical expressions of guilt, both of which turned to relief as they saw who it was.

"Blimey, Ginny. Don't sneak up on a bloke like that!"

"Well, if you weren't busy making mischief you might have heard us. We weren't exactly being quiet."

While we talked, Hermione had pulled Harry aside and was whispering furiously in his ear. As I turned to them, he nodded once and then grabbed my hand.

"Harry, what ...?"

He stopped my words with a hasty kiss and said, "trust me."

He was so happy, so at ease and in control of himself, that I mentally shrugged and followed his lead. We didn't even have to go that far to get to our destination. It was a stretch of corridor that I remembered all too well. There was the niche that Fred's body had been hidden in, the suit of armour still missing; there was the fallen masonry looking exactly as it had that day; and there was the gaping hole in the side of the castle. There was an eerie sort of peace around it, and my heart clogged my throat as I looked at it.

"We're leaving it like this," Harry said quietly.

"What?" I looked up at him, and saw sympathy and understanding beamed back at me in his eyes.

"Everyone's been feeling the way you do, Ginny. No-one could bear the idea of restoring the entire castle, and leaving no trace of the devastation. So, we decided to set up a weather charm over the hole in the wall, and strengthen the surrounding walls so it won't cave in or anything. We're keeping it this way so people can see what it was really like."

I was gripping his hand tightly, unable to take in what he was saying, but with a sense of relief that I wasn't going mad. Everyone felt the same way, and they had done something about it. I wondered why they had chosen Fred's place though, and Harry must have read my expression.

"It's one of the most damaged places in the castle. You can see the thickness of the walls where they've been destroyed, and it was the easiest of those places to weather-proof and strengthen. There are charms on this place like you wouldn't believe." He chuckled.

"I love it," I said. "I love it, Harry. Knowing this is here and always will be, makes it easier to go back to patching up the rest."

He smiled and kissed me, saying, "And I guess I should go back and see if Hermione has managed to talk Ron into putting that ward back up."

From then on, the work was less daunting to me. Knowing that there would be something left to show what had happened to the castle made it easier to get rid of the traces of the battle. It was only about a week later that it was finally done, and there were few signs that anything had happened that day. I was actually thankful, in the end. Hogwarts had that aching familiarity again, that sense that this was a place to come to study and learn. I looked over at Hermione and could see the same feeling reflected in her face.

We were standing outside with Ron and Percy, who was fussing around putting final details into the outer walls. Harry was inside making sure all the student records were in order, and we were making the most of the warm summer day while waiting for him. I threw my head back and revelled in the feeling of the sun on my face, so I missed the moment when Harry came out of the castle and headed towards us. When I opened my eyes and saw him, however, I grinned.

The grin faded as he reached us. He looked stressed and worried, which didn't seem quite right considering we were now finished and had several weeks left in which to enjoy ourselves before I had to come back here to start my year at school. I was sure something was wrong when he made some stupid excuse to drag me away, while still looking anxious.

"Harry. What's the matter? You look like someone who's going to start a hard job, not someone just finishing one."

"Well, I kinda am. But, that's not what I want to talk about."

"You're going to start a new job?"

"Yes ... yeah, I think so. But, Ginny, you never told me."

"Told you what?"

"About what happened at school last year."

Oh. He was right. I hadn't said anything about what we had been through last year. I hadn't wanted to worry him unnecessarily. I mean, this was Harry we were talking about; he was always trying to protect everyone. I knew he wasn't going to take what happened very well at all. Looking at his face, however, I realised that keeping it to myself had been the wrong course of action.

"I didn't want to worry you, Harry. It's all over and done, so what was the point of telling you?"

"The point? I don't know, Ginny. Maybe, the point would be to share things with each other, to trust each other."

Dammit, he was right, too. He'd told me all about the horcruxes and bits and pieces of what he'd been up to last year, but I'd been vague on what I had done. I realised I'd done to him exactly what I did to Mum and Dad while it was all happening. I glossed over the bad stuff in order to spare them, or perhaps to spare my own feelings in dealing with it. And now I'd done the same thing to Harry. But where Mum and Dad just accepted it, Harry was clearly hurt.

"I'm sorry, Harry. It was never about not trusting you. I just wanted to forget it, I think."

"I remember hearing about you trying to steal the sword of Gryffindor. I was so proud and impressed by you, but underneath it all I had this terrible fear that it would put you in danger. I tried so hard to keep you safe, Ginny, and I wish so much that you hadn't put yourself in that position. Going up against Snape and the Death Eaters like that, you could have been killed."

My temper surged to the surface at his words. Even now, I know that Harry is a protective git, that he always wants to do all the dangerous things himself so his friends aren't affected. That doesn't mean I _like_ him doing that, and I didn't like it any better back then.

"Oh, like you were sitting safe at home through it all?"

"I wasn't underage at the time, Ginny. And I was hardly ever in the actual presence of Death Eaters, whereas you ..."

"I had every right to do what I did. You weren't the boss of me, Harry Potter, and you still aren't. And you're a fine one to talk about getting into dangerous situations while underage."

We had been walking while we argued, and found ourselves at the gates to Hogwarts. Without waiting for Ron and the others, and without asking my permission, he grabbed my arm and apparated us back to the Burrow. As soon as we got there, I struggled out of his grip.

"You will never take me anywhere without asking again. Is that clear?" My voice was icy cold this time.

"Why don't you get it? You could have been hurt, and I could have lost you," he shouted at me, ignoring my words.

"And I spent that whole year knowing I could lose you, too. You don't get to pull that one on me, Potter. In fact ... I bloody thought I _had_ lost you." I was right in his face, and was shouting back, paying no attention to our surroundings.

I suddenly became aware of flashes of light going off around us, and became aware of the group of very interested reporters recording the moment.

"Merlin's bloody beard! That's all I need," I groaned. Still furious with Harry for bringing me here without asking, I snatched my hand away as he tried to take it, and stalked away from them all, past the wards and into the house.

When Harry had managed to avoid them and got himself inside as well, I had already calmed down. He looked shell-shocked too, and I went to him and wrapped my arms around his waist.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry we fought and I'm sorry those idiots saw it. It's going to be bad, isn't it?"

"Yeah, I think so."

I sighed, frustrated. We couldn't even have a bloody fight without it hitting the press.

"Nevermind. It's done now, and we can't take it back. So, what's this job you're 'kinda' starting soon?"

"Oh. Oh, well, Kingsley asked me to join the Auror department."

"Really? Harry, that's great! I know it's what you've always wanted. But ... then you definitely won't be coming back to school."

"I never was, Ginny. You know that. After last year, I couldn't just go back, not seriously."

I did know it, too. During the war he had become a man. I had noticed it that last day during his final showdown with Voldemort. There was no way that someone who had been through that transformation could go meekly back to school, but I had still held out a tiny bit of hope.

This made the next few weeks even more precious. For the first time since the war, I really confronted a future that didn't have Harry in it, at least a year's worth of future. I shivered, realising that he was once more going to be putting himself in the line of fire while I was cooped up at school waiting for him. This was becoming unbearably familiar.

"Well, on the bright side I guess Death Eaters won't be running the school and Voldemort won't be after you. It'll be positively tame compared to last year."

He chuckled and nodded, and we headed outside to enjoy the remaining sun. I was determined to enjoy every second of the time that remained to us, and it seemed he was too. We took advantage of this rare opportunity to be alone together to do some of that talking we hadn't been able to do in company. We snogged as well, of course, but the talking seemed more urgent at the time. After our fight we needed to clear the air, and this was the perfect time to do it, without our watch dogs being on top of us for once.


	4. Summer

Chapter Three: Summer.

The headlines the next day were even more uncomfortable than I had imagined. Above pictures of Harry and I standing toe to toe screaming at each other, ran words like 'Lovers' Spat on Eve of Potter Promotion.' The articles were even worse.

_Harry Potter may have saved the Wizarding World from its most dangerous attacker yet, but he can't save his own heart. Mr Potter was spotted in a furious argument with a young girl who this reporter believes to be Ginny Weasley, his one-time girlfriend from Hogwarts. The couple have been seen together during various activities, such as the memorials for the fallen at the Battle of Hogwarts and the rebuilding of the castle itself, and rumour has it that Mr Potter was about to propose to the young red-head when they had this devastating break up in the front yard of her family home. Both participants left the scene separately, and sources close to Mr Potter suggest that he is heartbroken as he moves back into his own estate in London. It is unknown what the argument was about, but we here at _Witch Weekly_ hope this doesn't dampen Mr Potter's enjoyment of his new job as Junior Assistant in the fabled Auror department at the Ministry of Magic, a position from which he is likely to rise very quickly given his impressive accomplishments against many of the known dark wizards currently at large in our society._

'Oh, for Merlin's sake! I hope no-one believes this rubbish!' I spat out as I sent the magazine hurtling across the room.

'Well, Ginny, you really were very careless about where you had that argument.'

'I know, Mum. Alright? I know. That really isn't helping.'

'Something else will come along tomorrow, and it will all be forgotten. Just, try not to let your temper get the better of you in front of reporters again.' There was a wicked gleam in her eye as she said it, and I hugged her. It was so nice to see Mum relaxed and a little jokey again that I almost didn't mind the reason for it. Almost, but not quite. I was still really annoyed by the various articles that had made such a mountain out of a tiny argument that was now forgotten.

'I'll try, Mum. But I can't make any promises; I did inherit your temper.'

'Is he really going to propose?'

'No! Mum, how could you even think that? I'm sixteen, and we've just come out of a terrible time. We haven't even really had time to get to know each other again.' Here, I cast her a dirty look for the militant chaperonage she'd had us under, which she ignored quite cheerfully. 'There's no way we're even ready to talk marriage yet.'

'Yes,' she said, looking thoughtful. 'You have time, I guess.' She sounded almost disappointed, and I felt a small surge of hope, that she might just relax her security on us. But then she shook her head and moved off to make some tea, and the incident was never referred to again.

Harry, Ron, Hermione and I spent most of that summer outside, still chaperoning each other, and occasionally George would come out too and we'd all play Quidditch. It would be Ron and Hermione onto George and me with Harry as seeker. Whenever he caught the snitch, the game was over and whichever side had the most points was the winner. I always pushed myself as much as I could with the old cleansweep that I had been riding. It was important to me to hone my skills in the game because I was determined to become a professional player one day. Harry shared my enthusiasm for the idea, and I know that if he had still had his firebolt with him he'd have made me use it. I was almost thankful that he'd lost it because I wanted no charity from him; I wanted to gain this on my own terms and with my own hard work.

It was a great time, all in all, even with the grief that intruded still at inconvenient moments, but I wished Harry and I had more time to spend together just us, just talking. I was also becoming really frustrated that we were stuck to barely passionate snogs in the company of others. I was restless with the need to have more, and I could tell he felt the same way. Mindful of our watchdogs, we did very little along those lines, but in the occasional meet-up we'd have at night after the others were in bed, I experienced enough to know that I liked having his hands on me and that I wanted _more_. I'm sure Mum knew about those meetings, but she had mellowed out in the time since the article came out and tolerated it. We knew, however, that while I was still an underage witch living in her house that she would never tolerate anything more than that and we respected her feelings.

The time at which Harry and I were to be parted again inched closer. Reminders of the last time we had been parted for a year surfaced all the time, this time that pang was sharper because we had been closer for longer. There was also a whisper in the back of my mind that he had died once. I didn't have to imagine what it would be like to lose him; I'd already lived it, and the fear that I could lose him again never really lessened, even though I knew he would basically be in schooling of his own during the year we were apart. I was reluctant to leave him behind even though I knew my education was really important. Leaving him behind this time felt like leaving part of myself here; I figured those strings that had tied me to him before he'd left last year had just bolted themselves tighter and even though we were still in the same place, I felt the loss of him like a physical ache already.

I was sitting by the pond one day, watching Harry and Ron behaving like the idiot boys they still were at times, when Hermione slid down beside me. I have to give it to her; she was a very perceptive person. Though, I guess in this case she was going through the same thing I was. I saw her squinting at Ron as she said, 'You're going to miss him, aren't you?'

'What? I ... no, I mean yes. But not, you know ... too much.'

'Don't lie, Ginny. I've seen you together. You're both head over heels.'

I sighed. 'Of course I'll miss him, Hermione. But I need to go back to school and he needs to move on. It's hard after this summer, but I've done it before in worse circumstances. I'll survive.'

I looked at her properly, and realised she was questioning me because she wanted to talk about it herself.

'So, what about you? You were with Ron for most of last year. How are you guys going to go?'

'You forget he walked out on us. I know exactly what it's like to be without him. But,' she added in a small voice, 'I didn't like it.'

I squeezed her hand. 'We'll be right. We have each other and they'll be able to visit at times. It won't be the not-knowingness we had before.'

She smiled at me, and agreed. But I know neither of us was as complacent as we were pretending.

As we moved into August, Mum's strict control became slacker, and we all found ourselves with a bit more 'alone time' which I know Harry and I took full advantage of, and I assumed Ron and Hermione did too. By that I mean we took the time to talk about those things that had been sitting between us. I made sure to let Harry know exactly why I didn't appreciate him just 'taking over' my life for me. I explained that when I had been with Dean, his romantic attempts to look after me had made me feel stifled and not my real self. I told him that one of the things that attracted me to Harry was that he never did that. So, now that things were safer and easier, I needed him to remember that I was still a capable person and didn't need coddling.

In return, he showed me the cards with my misdemeanours and punishments from last year. I winced while reading it. It really hadn't seemed _that_ bad when I was going through it, but seeing it in stark black and white made it all the more real. There was an awful lot of it, too. It was no wonder he'd been as upset as he was. I still didn't excuse what he did and said when we argued, but I did finally understand it.

My seventeenth birthday was a weird time. It was the first 'celebration' we'd had since the war ended (Harry's birthday having swung past modestly since it wasn't a 'coming of age'), so it was the first time we'd had to celebrate as a family since Fred had died. Mum tried, but there wasn't the same sense of unfettered joy we'd had, even at Harry's birthday last year or at Bill's wedding. Then, the war was on us, and we found reason to celebrate in the darkness. Now, it was over, and we had joy, but there was that terrible sense of loss we were still learning to live with.

We had a big breakfast together and I was given the usual coming of age presents. My parents gave me a watch very similar to Ron's, and he and Hermione gave me a set of new Quidditch accessories. Harry gave me a new broom. I tried to stop him, but he told me he'd trash it if I didn't use it. He was very careful not to get me the top of the line model, since he knew I would never accept that. In the end I took it, because I was serious about playing Quidditch that year, and even then I had my sights on a place in one of the major league teams. It was for my birthday after all, not just Harry shelling out money frivolously.

After breakfast I went to help Mum in the kitchen, more to corner her on her own than from any sense that I 'should' be helping. She was standing by the bench with her head bowed, and I wrapped my arms around her.

'It's OK, Mum. It'll get better some day.'

'I'm being silly,' she said. 'This is your day, but you're my last baby to grow up, and I just can't help it. It's all hit me at once that we're losing everyone.'

'You're not losing us, Mum. Not really. Percy hasn't even moved out again yet, Ron's hanging around looking useless, and I'm still at school. We'll always be here – and probably longer than you want some of us.'

I turned away and started to clear the dishes into the sink (with my wand of course, now that I could since I was of age). Mum wiped her eyes and when she saw what I was doing, she shooed me away.

'No, no. You need to go enjoy this day. Take Harry, go for a walk or something.'

I gaped at her. This was the first time she had explicitly sent Harry and me somewhere alone together. All the other times we'd ended up alone had been unexpected. Mum, still wiping a tear from her eyes, chuckled as she looked at my face.

'Ginny. You're of age now. Go enjoy time with your boyfriend. Think of it as another birthday present, but don't expect it to happen too often.'

I didn't have to be told again, and hurried off, confused as to why we were being given time alone because I was 'of age' when Ron and Hermione had been kept apart just as much as we had. I wasn't complaining, however, and neither was Harry as we made our way to the far end of the orchard. It was one of those glorious late summer days that seemed golden. The leaves were beginning to turn on the trees and the sunlight seemed to pool under them.

Enjoying my newfound ability to use magic whenever I wanted to, I floated a blanket and a picnic basket out of the house and over to us.

'Nice. Much classier than my first attempts to use magic when I turned 17,' Harry said lazily, lying on his back watching me. 'I poked myself in the eye with my glasses.'

I collapsed onto him, giggling, and his arms came around me reflexively. Suddenly, the air around us was filled with tension. We became aware that we were the only people in the vicinity, that we were truly alone. Both of us remembered his birthday last year, and the present I'd given him. I stared into Harry's eyes and the look in them changed slowly from amusement to something deeper. The air buzzed with electricity as I leaned towards him.

Now, I'm not going to lie, or sugarcoat what we did that day, but nor am I going to go into it in detail. You don't actually need to know, after all, and there are _some_ things that should really remain private. It was, as is usual in these situations, messy and awkward, and silly and sweet and I wanted to do it again. I've read, in my time, numerous 'unauthorised' tales of my life with Harry and almost all of them have us as perfect lovers right off the bat. I can assure you that we were as nervous and unsure and unco-ordinated as any other couple trying it out for the first time. But what we lacked in finesse we made up for in enthusiasm and humour, and we had fun. Shall we leave it at that?

Sometimes in the late afternoon we went back to the house where we were greeted by knowing looks and ribald jokes from various male members of my family. George was almost his old self again as he teased us. I didn't mind. Firstly, I was pretty sure they didn't know what had happened, and secondly, I didn't really care if they did know. I was of age and could do pretty well what I wanted, and it was facing my huge and boisterous family that the idea really sank in. None of these people truly had a say in what I did anymore. Oh, they could make suggestions and out of respect I'd do most of what Mum and Dad wanted me to, but by wizarding law, I no longer actually had to obey any of them. It felt liberating.

I smiled up at Harry, who was wearing a rather dazed expression, squeezed his hand and went to sit down with Hermione who was talking to Dad about the best way to get to Australia and find her parents. The afternoon slid into evening, and I enjoyed just spending time together with my whole family before the summer waned completely and I had to set off to school again. Altogether, after the rocky start to the day, it had turned out to be one of my best birthdays, and one I would remember forever.


	5. Back to School

Chapter 4: Back to School.

The days between my birthday and the train ride back to Hogwarts slipped past alarmingly fast. In no time at all, I was clinging to Harry on the platform, finally facing the length of time it would be before I could hold him again. I held onto him until the last possible moment and he was just as unwilling to let go as I was. I refused to cry because I didn't want this last moment with Harry for months to involve tears. However, I was very choked up when we eventually forced ourselves apart and I found myself staring at him out the window of the train. He was standing with Ron, his hand raised, and I did let a tear slip as we began to pull out of the station. It reminded me of that day all those years ago when Harry and Ron were on their way to Hogwarts and I was left on the platform, but this time I had to leave them behind.

Hermione was throwing last minute admonitions out the window to Ron along with endearments, and I grinned at Harry. It was so brilliantly _them_ that it lightened my mood considerably.

When we could no longer see the boys, Hermione and I leaned back into the carriage and slumped onto the seats.

'There's no going back now, then.'

'No,' she sighed. 'At least I don't have prefect duties any more. After a year off, I really don't know how my studies will go.'

I giggled. 'You'll be fine, Hermione; you always are. You know you thrive on study.'

'I just don't know if I remember enough,' she fretted. 'What about you? After last year, your studies have been interrupted as well.'

'I don't really care.' I sniggered again as I saw the look on her face. 'I'm only here to get better at quidditch. OK,' I relented, as she started to get that shocked look on her face, 'I do need to pass my exams. But honestly, even after last year, I think I'm OK on that side of things.'

There seemed to be an awful lot of people passing by our compartment, and all of them were staring at me with odd smirks.

'What's going on, Hermione? Why is everyone staring like that?'

Hermione looked around, and noticed the stares. She looked back at me in bafflement, and neither of us could work out what was going on. We eventually forgot about the mystery, instead discussing how she had found her parents in Australia and managed to get them back home. It had been a real trial for her and Ron, but in the end finding them had been surprisingly easy, and they were now safely back in England with a bunch of made up memories of the world cruise they had been on. Finally, as the school got closer, Hermione began organising us into our robes.

As we approached the school in the thestral-pulled carriages, that many people on the train were now able to see, I felt weird. Last time I was here I was having a furious argument with Harry. It was weird to think that this was to be my home again, rather than the place of battle and then of reconstruction that I was now used to. It was like I had double vision as I looked at it. On one hand, I remembered the place it had always been: my school, my home for so many years. On the other hand, it was still the scene of that battle. Looking up, I could see the gaping hole that had been left in the wall of the castle. I remembered how I'd worried that the battle would be wiped out of people's minds if we fixed the castle, but I realised almost immediately that would never have happened anyway. Everyone in my carriage looked at the building with identical expressions: sadness and hope mingled together. We had all been there, and as long as any of us lived, this place would never be 'just a school' again.

I noticed the weird stares of everyone even more as we got into the Great Hall for the opening feast. The Slytherins were openly sneering at me, and even my fellow Gryffindors were looking at me with expressions of distaste. What the hell was going on?

'Hermione,' I whispered urgently. 'Hermione, they are all still staring.'

'Oh, yes,' said Luna, who had come with us into the Hall. 'They are probably talking about that _Witch Weekly_ article.'

'What _Witch Weekly_ article?' I asked in confusion, just as Luna left us to sit down at the Ravenclaw table. 'The one about that argument I had with Harry? Why would that make anyone stare? Most of these people must have seen at least one argument in their lives.'

'I don't know,' said Hermione, getting that look on her face; the one where she became like a dog with a bone until she had worked out a problem.

All through the feast it was the same. I couldn't eat much because of all the attention I was getting, and because I ached to have Harry here with me. If nothing else, he could always make me laugh, no matter how stressful the situation. Hermione kept up a flurry of conversation with me, to take my mind off it, but I could see that she was as distracted as I was. Very few from her year had returned to school, and everyone k new she'd been with Harry for most of last year, so she was getting a lot of attention too.

The sorting seemed to take forever because as well as those who were eleven this year, there were also all the children of Muggles who should have been here last year but were prevented by Voldemort's regime. So the feast dragged on, and by the time Professor McGonagall had made her final speech and sent everyone up to the dormitories, I was ready to be alone and get out of the limelight.

I made my way through the cluster of Gryffindors in the common room, avoiding some boys I didn't really know who seemed to be very friendly all of a sudden, and making my way up to my familiar dormitory which now had Hermione's bed in it as well as those of me and my old room mates. I grinned as I thought about that ward Harry and Ron had left off. I wondered how long it would be before one of the boys discovered that the stairs didn't become a slide anymore. I was still grinning to myself when Hermione came in, a thunderous look on her face.

'What? What is it? Did you find out?'

'You really don't want to know, Ginny.'

'Yes, I do. I somehow doubt that all the staring will go away just because I don't know why they're doing it. I'd rather know what's up then imagine something awful.'

'Oh, well ... er ... OK, then.' She threw a dogeared copy of _Witch Weekly_ on my bed. The blurb on the front told me everything I need to know: _Harry Potter Enters Manhood; exclusive story on the witch who helped him._ I felt my stomach clench as I looked at it. Somehow I knew what the tone of this article would be.

'How the hell did they find out?' I gasped.

'You mean it's true?' Hermione sounded shocked, and I managed a slight chuckle at her tone.

'Don't tell me you haven't thought about it with Ron,' I evaded, then eyed the magazine with distaste. 'Merlin. I guess I'd better see what they're saying.'

Hermione just gave me a quelling look for my comment, and picked the magazine up because I was still eyeing it like it would explode, and hadn't made a move to look at it myself. She flipped to the page, and began reading in a determined voice.

_It seems that the spat reported a few weeks ago between Ginny Weasley and Harry Potter was a flash in the pan. _Witch Weekly's _sources report that the couple reconciled in the days after the fight, with many suggesting that Miss Weasley realised that she was about to lose her hold on the wizarding world's most famous wizard. She used all her wiles to get him back, including seducing him in a desperate attempt to make sure that she still had her clutches on him, his fame and his wealth. Yes, you heard it here first: Harry Potter is now a man, thanks to the manipulations of this very determined witch. _

_Reliable sources claim Miss Weasley is an extremely possessive witch who will stop at nothing to ensure that she remains firmly in the public eye, selfishly keeping our hero on a string despite being linked to several other wizards at various events. While Mr Potter is said to be besotted with this temptress, we are told that Miss Weasley has little to no interest in him, but is fascinated by his fame._

_'She never really liked him,' one fellow student has told _Witch Weekly_ in an exclusive interview, 'she's been after him since she first heard about him, and was always obsessed with how famous he was. It was really pathetic the way she ran after him all the time. Of course, his money doesn't hurt; her family is very poor. She'd do anything to keep her claws in him.' _

_Indeed, Miss Weasley is one of the seven children of Arthur Weasley, who works in a low-paying job for the Ministry of Magic. Attempts to contact the family of this gold-digger have been unsuccessful, but _Witch Weekly_ understands that they are shocked at her outrageous behaviour and have banished her back to Hogwarts School in the hopes of better controlling her there, and trying to keep her away from Mr Potter, who they regard as a surrogate son. Harry Potter himself refused to comment on his newly acquired manhood, but it is hoped that he knows just how many other lovers Miss Weasley has taken, and is suitably warned by her behaviour with them._

'Merlin's bloody pants! My mum reads this magazine; she's going to be so upset.'

'She'll be mad at the reporter, surely, not you.'

'I know. But if she thinks there's even a kernel of truth in it she's going to have kittens. You saw the way she was all summer. If she finds out we really did ... well, I'm glad I'm here and not at home.'

I clutched at my tummy as the reality of this hit me. First, how the hell had they known what had happened between Harry and me? Or had they just made a lucky guess? I'd never know, but now the damage was done. It had been so sweet and lovely, a wonderful memory I had carried with me when I left Harry, and it had been sullied by this piece of trash. I had a sudden thought.

'Harry's going to be furious! He's so private that this is going to make him so embarrassed ... and angry.'

Hermione gave a humourless laugh. 'I wouldn't like to be that reporter when he gets his hands on them. Actually, who was it?' She skimmed through the article again until she reached the name at the bottom. 'Well, that explains it all. That revolting Rita Skeeter is at it again.' Her eyes blazed with fury as she stared down at the magazine in her hand.

I sighed. 'That figures. There's no-one as good at spinning a nasty tale out of rumour and innuendo as she is. You don't think ... that Harry will believe any of this do you?' I asked it in a small voice, not wanting to believe that he would, but aware that Harry can be all too willing to believe the worst about himself. There was every possibility that he could think I just liked his fame and his money.

'No! No, Ginny. Don't even think that. I told you, I've seen you together. If he could think that for a minute, then he's a bigger prat than I thought he was.'

'He can be a really big prat, though. I just don't want him to think that ... that I just got back together with him because of his money or whatever.'

'Well, tell him. Talk to him, write him a letter, or something.'

I nodded. I was going to be talking to him via the floo later that night anyway, but now I found myself really anxious to see him. I wanted to know if he'd seen the article and what he thought of it if he had.

At midnight, when everyone had cleared out of the common room except for Hermione and me, I heard the fire sputter, and Harry's head appeared. One look at him and I knew he had seen the article. I rushed over to him, with no idea what to say. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Hermione disappear up the stairs to the girls' dormitory.

'Harry! Did you see...?'

'Ginny, I've been so worried about you. I can't stand that woman; she ought to be jinxed into oblivion for writing that piece of bollocks. How are you? How's it been there?'

'Pretty awful, but I'll cope. It's you I'm worried about. How did she find out about it? Is your security compromised?'

'No, I'm fine. I think she just guessed, to be honest. But I'm going to kill her if I ever see her again. That was the vilest piece she has ever run on me, and I hate that she involved you.'

'What about Mum? Did she read it? Did she kill you?'

'I haven't seen her yet, and I think I want to keep out of her way for a bit, to be honest. Shame I'm staying in her house.' He chuckled slightly. 'I hope no-one there is too awful to you. Let them know that if they do, they have me to deal with.'

'It's OK, Harry; I can look after myself. It's going to be horrid for a while, but they'll move on. They always do. I miss you already, though.'

'Me, too. But I'll be there for the first Hogsmeade weekend, and I'll send you an owl when I manage to track that woman down and hex her ears off.'

I laughed, reassured. Obviously Hermione was right. Harry didn't believe all that garbage, and it was so good to see him. So much had happened that it seemed more like days than hours since we'd parted. We talked for a bit longer and when I said goodbye to him I was feeling far more at ease. He always had that effect on me.

The next few days were excruciating. The 'friendly' boys kept trying to get close to me, and I found myself flinging hexes reasonably often just to get away from them. Thankfully, my reputation as an angry, hex-happy harpy kicked in again, and they soon learnt to stay away. Getting rid of the unwanted suitors didn't stop the rumours or the stares I was attracting, though. Finally I understood, viscerally, what Harry had gone through in his fifth year. I had the same bone-deep incomprehension that these people could believe this stuff. I mean, they knew me, they used to like me (well, most of them did), and yet they were all willing to believe this tripe just because it was printed in a magazine. I spent the time simmering with anger over the whole thing. Of course that did nothing to dissipate the gossip. Everyone seemed to believe that I was angry because I'd been 'found out' and, while I never dignified any of the questions levelled at me with a response, I was always tempted to shove my real feelings back in their faces.

The worst thing came several mornings later when the gossip was beginning to die down and I was almost able to eat when everyone else did rather than much earlier or later to avoid all the stares and whispering. I had got to breakfast late, and had just half-heartedly reached for some rubbery toast, when Percy's owl arrived carrying something red in its beak. My mouth going dry, I dropped the toast because I knew what it was going to be. Hermes landed in front of me and ruffled his feathers pompously as he dropped the already blackening red envelope on my plate. I picked it up, determined to get this over with. Mum's voice echoed around the (thankfully almost empty) Great Hall.

'Ginevra Weasley! I have never been more ashamed of anyone in my life as I am of you today. I have just had a discussion with your boyfriend and we did not bring you up to behave like this!' I winced as I thought about poor Harry 'discussing' this with my parents, but the thought only lasted a second as my mother's voice carried on booming. 'That Skeeter woman is vile and ridiculous, but it seems she got the very basics right. You brought this on yourself and you had better learn your lesson. Try not to give that Skeeter woman any more ammunition to twist your life out of recognition. And behave yourself when you're with Harry.'

I was mortified. She couldn't possibly have put all that in a non-audible letter? Hermione, who was sitting with me, shuddered in sympathy as the tirade ended. Around the Hall I could see smug 'I knew it' looks and a renewed vigour in the stares I was getting. I could only wait and hope that this wouldn't keep interest up for too much longer. Being the school pariah was no fun at all. I sighed, held my head higher again, and stalked out of the Great Hall to my first class. This looked like it was going to be a _very_ long term.


	6. Hogsmeade

Chapter 5: Hogsmeade.

I got through September with a combination of determination and great friends. Luna and Hermione were always by my side, and while I felt a constant need to see Harry again and just forget the horrible stories about us for once, I was actually reasonably content. Many people who had either heard, or heard of, Mum's howler were being much nicer to me. I couldn't quite work out why, until Hermione explained the conclusion she had come to.

'I think your mum isn't as angry as she made that sound.'

'How can you say that? Didn't you hear her voice booming around the Hall saying exactly why she thinks I'm the world's biggest scarlet woman, as Ron would say?'

'Actually, no, that's not what she said.'

'Pardon? I was there; I think I know what was said about me for all to hear.'

'Ginny, listen to me. All she said was that she knows what happened between you and Harry, then she added that he's your boyfriend, not just a conquest, and then she said that Skeeter woman twisted everything else. '

I was getting more and more angry. 'Yeah, thanks for reminding me. It was humiliating to have my mother do that to me! Why did she have to go confirming all the rumours?'

Hermione huffed in exasperation, but her voice was quite gentle when she added, 'Don't you see? She was dispelling the rumours that are outrageous, by showing what she knows of the truth. By admitting some of it was true, and denying the rest, she's actually helping you.'

I sighed. Hermione was right, but the memory still stung. Whatever Hermione said, I knew that Mum wasn't completely happy with me. She _did_ say I brought it on myself, and I knew she meant that part. And it still hurt that something that had been so special for me, something I had shared only with Harry, was now common knowledge because of something my mother said.

At the end of September, however, something happened to take my mind off it. Quidditch trials were held, and I was desperate to get on the team. I felt so alive on a broom, so at home. And, even though I say it myself, I was good. Ever since I had played my first game back in fourth year, I had my sights set on doing this professionally. There was nothing I liked better than being up there, part of a team; all of us focussed on beating the opponent to the ball. Being on a broom was amazing; playing in a game was something more.

With my new broom I was now able to put myself through even harder paces. I trained as much as I could in the lead up to the trials, and by the time they came around I was aware of everything it was capable of. It wasn't as good as Harry's old Firebolt had been; that was still one of the very best brooms on the market, but it was far better than the old Cleansweep I'd been using up 'til now. I pushed myself and my broom to the limit when I tried out and was chosen as one of the chasers. I was flushed with pride in myself. No nasty rumour was going to stop me from achieving what I wanted to.

The day after the trials was the first Hogsmeade visit of the year and now that I had time to think about it, I felt tingly. A warm fluttery sensation would set off in the pit of my tummy every time I thought about being with Harry after so long apart. I spent that night in quiet conversation with Hermione, too keyed up by the tryouts and the thought of seeing Harry again to settle to doing any study.

The jittery feeling intensified the closer we got to the village, putting a stupid grin on my face and making me giggle. I reminded myself so much of when I was ten, when all I wanted was to catch a glimpse of the famous Harry Potter and had those little-girl daydreams about marrying him. I still felt the same way, still got the heated blush in my cheeks when I thought that one day we might, possibly, sometime in the future, be married. The best thing about now, however, was that this time I knew he felt the same way. I had come so far since then yet he still had the same devastating effect on me, but thankfully, this time he knew I existed and was as keen to see me as I was to see him.

Without really noticing, I increased my pace in my hurry to reach the village. Beside me, Hermione grinned and adjusted her pace to keep up with mine, both too giddy with excitement to speak. In fact I think that was the giddiest I'd ever seen Hermione up to that point, and we both broke out into bouts of stupid giggles. I kept trying to force myself to keep it together, but the giggles won out in the end until I really _was_ acting the way eleven year old Ginny had, and that thought was sobering enough to keep me to a mere idiotic grin for the last stage of that too-long walk.

We finally rounded a curve in the road, and suddenly there was the village – and there he was, too, waiting right on the edge of the tiny town. I barely noticed Ron beside him as I ran the last few paces to get to Harry. I threw my arms around him, and felt his tight around my back. I buried my face in his neck and just breathed. We had talked by floo on many occasions, but being unable to actually hold him had been almost unbearable, and I had missed this – the unique smell of him, and the feel of his arms around me. His hands slid into my hair and I pulled back a little to look at him, losing myself in the familiar green gaze.

Without realising how it happened, I was suddenly kissing him fiercely, trying to make up for all the time we'd missed. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see we were drawing many curious stares from people passing by into Hogsmeade, but I didn't care. Let them think I was a gold digger; Harry didn't believe it, and that was all that mattered. He was all that mattered. After an eternity, we broke apart and I was able to take in our surroundings. Ron and Hermione were uttering love-sick murmurs at each other, still oblivious to the world. I grinned and took Harry's hand, giving him a final welcoming peck before heading towards the village.

We wandered for most of the afternoon, content just to be in each other's company. Sometimes, looking at him, I felt like dragging him off to one of the Inns and shagging him, but I was mindful of Mum's warnings about behaviour. I know he was, too, because occasionally he would look at me with a blaze in his eyes that had nothing to do with the heat from the sun that day. But he just pursed his lips, squeezed my hand and led us back towards other people. Finally, I decided to talk to him about it.

We had reached the outskirts of the village again, and were on a deserted stretch of road when I broached the subject.

'Was it really bad, Harry? Mum's interrogation?'

'Well, let's just say, I'm happy I'm still fully intact.' I gave a reluctant giggle, and he squeezed my hand in acknowledgement . 'It was unpleasant, but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. She seemed a little disappointed, but accepted it okay.'

'Hermione thinks she was trying to help with the rumours when she sent me that howler.'

'From what you told me, it does make sense. What do you think?'

'I don't know. I wish it had never happened,' I muttered, looking away and scuffing my foot in the leaves crackling on the ground.

He stopped walking then, a crestfallen look on his face. My mouth dropped open in horror.

'No. No, I don't mean that.' I reached out to touch his face, willing him to believe me. 'No, Harry, I would never, ever wish that day away. I meant the whole article and Mum finding out, and everything.' For the first time I was able to explain to someone else who would understand, and I stared into his eyes tracing his emotions there. 'It was such a personal thing we had together, and now the whole world knows – thanks to Mum.'

He gave me a quick hug. 'I know. But, no matter what, none of them were there. That was just us. To be honest, I don't care who knows about it, because the only people who know what it _really_ was are right here.'

I stared at him for a second, then grabbed his head and dragged him down for a kiss. He didn't seem to mind. More than ever, I wanted to go to that Inn with him, but I knew we needed to stay in sight, letting everyone see that we were just like any of the other couples milling around the village. It hurt that we couldn't act the way we really wanted to because everyone's eyes were on us, but at least I was here with him, and the empty feeling that had taken up residence somewhere in the pit of my stomach was gone for those few hours we were together.

Apart from his annoying tendency to keep me from battles (and come on, let's be honest, how often do we really get into that sort of thing?), Harry does this really great thing where he completely supports me in everything I want to do. It was no surprise then, when Harry was really happy for me when I told him about my new place on the quidditch team. He knew how much I loved Quidditch and was always eager to hear what new feats I'd got up to. During that hard training period, Harry had egged me on in every floo conversation, wanting to know every detail of what I had done, and he was always suggesting ways that I could improve or betting with me that I couldn't get my speed even faster. It was partly his encouragement that had helped me push myself to my limits.

So we spent a fair amount of that day discussing the team and strategies for winning, and we also talked about what I needed to do to get noticed by the big teams in the league. Since it was my ambition to play professionally, and we knew that sometime during the school year the big teams sent reps to see what was happening in quidditch at all the schools, I needed to be at my best this whole season. Harry also teased me that I was only getting good because I'd accepted his broom, waggling his eyebrows as he said it, making me giggle again. I still had to start a scuffle with him over that, the prat, reminding him that it had actually been me who won the quidditch cup for Gryffindor in my fifth year, on an old school broom, too, thank you very much. He only conceded the point after I'd got him on the ground and stuffed some crunchy leaves down his shirt.

We spent some time together with Ron and Hermione, who were looking so mussed that it was obvious they didn't share our hang-ups about visiting inns. I looked at Harry and couldn't help but smirk at him about it. Hermione noticed and blushed scarlet as she realised we knew where they'd been. Harry cleared his throat and suggested that we should visit the Shrieking Shack; but the ghosts of the past seemed to whisper there, and the looks on the faces of the three I was with struck home once again exactly how much of a toll the war had taken on everyone. It was here, I remembered with a startled gasp, that they had heard Voldemort demand that Harry give himself up. It was here that they had witnessed Snape being killed. I shuddered just thinking about it. I had become used to the way the past echoed around me at the castle, but Harry and Ron didn't have that familiarity and their reactions made it all fresh to me again. Their faces reflected what we all knew: that none of us had really healed yet, even though we had days where we forgot for a little while. We moved away and had a butterbeer at the Three Broomsticks, laughing and talking together almost naturally, but the moment still cast a shadow over the day.

Despite that visit, it was a great day, and even the pang of saying goodbye to Harry again didn't lessen the enjoyment of the day we'd shared. Trudging back up to the castle with Hermione, I really felt that I could now endure all the stares and the smirks and the unwanted attention. Being with Harry again had reminded me of everything I had going for me. The world had seen fit to throw some huge challenges at us, but we had survived and had come out stronger.


	7. Christmas Cheer

**Chapter 6: Christmas Cheer**

The time until the Christmas holiday flew past almost in the blink of an eye. I studied hard, played quidditch harder and spent hours on the floo to Harry. Seriously, I think we should have had shares in the floo connection company, we used it that often. Now, I'm sure that wasn't normally allowable for students, but because Harry was involved the staff seemed to look the other way. I do know it bothered the other students whose access was so much more restricted that we got preferential treatment, and the mutterings about my gold-digging behaviour never really went away. I didn't care though; I took shameless advantage of this one good payoff from him being 'the Chosen One' – we had enough crap to deal with, so I felt justified in doing this. At least that's what I told myself every time I saw the sour faces of my house mates as I knelt at the fireplace.

In between my long talks with Harry, I increasingly found my days planned out for me. Hermione had scheduled her entire year, it seemed, and had dragged me kicking and screaming along with her. I mutinied when she tried to tie me to only one quidditch session a week, and she eventually relented. I was able to be on the broom almost as often as I could have wished. NEWT studies were very hard, much harder than I'd ever have imagined, even after the disastrous teaching we had last year. I was OK with all the normal subjects (Charms, Transfiguration, History of Magic etc) even though I'd missed several months at the end of last year. I managed to ditch Muggle Studies, but Defense Against the Dark Arts was really intense. The new teacher, a dry old woman who had been dragged out of retirement for that year, didn't care that we had basically not been taught anything in the last year and seemed to be trying to cram two years' worth of work into the first half of this one.

I found myself wishing a hundred times that Harry was teaching us again. He, at least, understood where we were coming from and explained things in a student-friendly way. Still, although it was hard it wasn't impossible and unlike Hermione I didn't care about getting top marks. It would be enough for me if I passed well enough to get a decent job if my quidditch ambitions fell through. Hermione, on the other hand, looked constantly stressed and worried and on the rare occasions she allowed me to take her books off her and make her relax she looked lost and incomplete.

In all this time, I had little communication with home. I still hadn't quite forgiven Mum for that howler and so any letters I sent them were always very factual and to the point. In return, Mum tried to be her usual self but I could sense her reluctance to 'deal with' me in print. I was sure there was a lecture in store for me, and I dreaded the return home for Christmas even though it would mean seeing Harry again. Harry had been a little more forthcoming about his 'discussion' with Mum and an even more squirm-worthy one that Dad had put him through, and it had become perfectly clear why he had been so hands off in Hogsmeade that day. They had threatened all sorts of dire consequences if we ended up in the media again. If they could be like that with _him_, I shuddered to think what I was in store for. I had half-expected that Mum would turn up at one of the Hogsmeade weekends as well as Harry, but it seemed she was saving everything for the holiday.

I stepped off the train expecting to see Harry waiting for me, but instead I saw George and Ron (who was craning his neck awkwardly looking for Hermione, who was still bustling around with her things on the train). I swallowed as I looked at George's face; he wasn't his usual bantering self and that did not bode well for a fun holiday. For the first time, I wondered what it must have been like for Harry to be confronted by a whole raft of protective Weasley brothers as well as my parents.

'Hi George,' I said brightly. 'How's things?'

'Not too bad, little sis. Mum's got your boyfriend on house arrest, but other than that it's all pretty normal.'

'Great. This is sure to be a pleasant reunion,' I muttered.

'What was that, sis? Do I hear a tone of moral outrage there? I'm not sure you're entitled to moral outrage.' He smirked at me as I opened my mouth to protest, but I could tell that he was mostly teasing. 'The press love you guys and the juicy life you lead.'

'Merlin! Are you saying there's been more of that rubbish? Is that why Mum's got her claws into Harry today?'

'I don't know that it's all rubbish. The articles seem pretty convincing. The ones with the charming pictures of you in your bathrobe with standy-up hair are particularly entertaining. I didn't know it was possible to get boys into the girls' dormitories at Hogwarts.'

'Merlin's bloody beard! Harry's been nowhere near my dormitory and you know it, you prat. And I don't know why you're so concerned, either. You were all for it on my birthday.

'That was before I, along with the rest of world, knew it was true.'

'You stinking hypocrite! Like you're pure as the driven snow yourself.'

We continued the friendly bickering the whole way back to the Burrow, with George getting in enough of his barbs in for me to know exactly what his thoughts were on me and Harry while still being reasonably low-key about it. I figured Mum would be a whole other story.

The first person I saw when I got home was Harry, who was pacing around outside in the snow waiting for us. I gave him a quick hug, which was all I seemed to be permitted before we were whisked inside and herded into the kitchen with Mum and Dad, while everyone else was banished to the Living Room. I sighed. I had hoped for time to sort my thoughts out before the inquisition began.

'Alright, you two. Harry's heard all this before, but we think you need to know our thoughts here, Ginny.'

'I think I got the message from that howler, Mum. It was very clear.' I had gone into stubborn mode, and the tone of my voice reflected that. I was in no mood to be lectured yet again by my parents for something they had no business interfering in.

'Ginny,' said Dad in a gentle voice. 'You've got to understand something. Whether you like it or not, Harry is a very famous wizard. There will be stories, lots of them, for years to come, and if you two keep this up, you will be involved, too.'

I glared at him. 'If we do? If? You think this is some fly-by-night thing, don't you? That we're going to break up, don't you? Or maybe that's what you want.' I was getting almost incoherent in my indignation, and slammed my lips shut before I said anything too terrible.

'That's not what I said, Ginny. You need to be aware of what your life will be like, that's all I'm saying. You'll have to be better than best to avoid nasty slander, and that's a hard life to live.'

'You're not kidding,' muttered Harry. Dad smiled at him kindly and I squeezed his hand.

'And you need to understand that I don't care. There will be stories no matter what we do, so while I'm not going to be stupid about it, I'm not changing the way I live just to pander to them.'

I turned to look at Harry, who was shuffling in his seat with and uncomfortable expression on his face. Looking into his eyes I felt suddenly calm, even during this prickly conversation. I held his gaze for several seconds and the tension in his face relaxed, too. I looked over at Mum. She was looking at us with an almost unreadable expression on her face, but there was a tenderness in her eyes and I knew that she was almost converted. Maybe Hermione had been right about Mum's motives for the howler. She was uncharacteristically quiet for this conversation, allowing Dad to do the honours, and I knew that the fight was already won; it was just a matter of how long it would take for the white flags to come out.

'Look, I'm seventeen. I'm of age so there's nothing wrong with being with my boyfriend. The press will always say what they want to say, but we know the truth.'

Mum sighed, and looked over at Dad, who nodded at her. 'We know that, dears. It's just that we don't want you to be hurt ... either of you.'

'I won't hurt her, you know that, right?' Harry's voice held a slight hint of anxiety along with the defiance he was trying to portray, and I squeezed his hand again.

'It's not you we're worried about, Harry. It's what being with you means. These articles ...'

'Are crap and you know it, Mum,' I interrupted her, 'it won't matter who Harry chooses or if he chooses no-one. His life is going to be under the spotlight. That's no reason to make him suffer just because you want to protect me. I don't need protection. I can look after myself, and this is making me happy. Isn't that what's important?'

'Of course it is,' Dad said. 'And we're not trying to stop you seeing each other. Just ... be careful and discreet, OK?'

'What do you mean?'

'Well, with everyone here for the holiday we all need to double up. So you two will have to be in together.'

I gaped at him. 'But, Hermione ...'

'Will be in with Ron.' Mum chuckled as she took in our faces. 'Oh, yes. This is not the only one of these talks we'll be conducting today.'

'But ... I don't understand.'

'No use shutting the cage door after the kneazle's escaped, is it?' She pursed her lips, and it was obvious to me that she wasn't as happy about this as Dad seemed to be.

She left the kitchen with Dad in her wake, leaving Harry and I sitting at the table, still stunned.

Hours later I was making a huge pile of paper chain decorations for Christmas when Mum came and sat down with me. Everyone else was talking together in the main part of the lounge and Harry had challenged Ron to a game of chess. Mum and I were on the edges, watching what was happening. She picked up some paper pieces and began twisting them together. Doing this by hand was traditional to our family, since it allowed the underage family members to join in on some of the Christmas preparations. Even though it was now unnecessary, I still enjoyed the physicality of twisting the paper by hand.

'Are you OK, Ginny?' Mum asked after we'd been there for a few minutes.

'I'm fine, Mum. It's been difficult, but I'm surviving.'

'You know this was all your father's idea, don't you?'

I smiled at her, sensing her intense discomfort over this, and said, 'I guessed.'

'I'm not happy about it, Ginny, but he reminded me that you're of age and we don't want to drive you out of our home. I just ... I'd rather you waited until you graduated, at least. I don't want you to throw your life away over some boy.'

I bristled. 'He's not some boy, Mum. And you know I won't even be seeing him that much 'til I finish school. Just this holiday and a couple of Hogsmeade visits and that's it.'

'I know. But the articles, Ginny,' she pressed. 'They're so interested in him, and they are so rude about you.'

'Mum, I have to ask you something,' I said, abruptly changing the subject. 'Why did you send me that howler?' I kept my eyes fixed on the chains I was making, not wanting to show Mum the depth of the betrayal I had felt over that letter.

'I hadn't had time to think about it, love. Before I talked to Harry I wanted to believe it was all lies, but I knew somehow that it wasn't, and it hurt that you'd been laid open to the sorts of accusations in that article. I just wanted to protect you and I knew I couldn't. So I did the only thing I could think of.'

'You squashed all the fake rumours in the story.' My voice was flat as I thought about how she had done it, and how it had hurt.

'You worked it out?'

'Hermione did, but it still hurt Mum. Until then, no-one knew if any of it was true or not. After that, they all knew, and it was awful.' My voice cracked a little on the last word. Mum dropped the chains she was working on and pulled me to her in a quick hug.

'I know and I'm sorry. I didn't really think it through. I don't like the idea that you're growing up, I guess, but your father made me see that I had to let go. You're of age and we can't protect you any longer. Besides, if we keep you apart that will just give that Skeeter woman more ammunition.' The smile she directed at me was almost cheeky, and my heart lightened a little.

'Thanks, Mum. And I promise I will try not to do anything that will rile the press up anymore. It's not like we want to live so much in the spotlight, it's just -- it just seems to happen.'

Despite the parental permissions we'd received, neither Harry nor I was all that comfortable with the idea of sleeping together. It was one thing to want to shag him spontaneously, but quite another to consciously do it with the weight of familial expectation hanging over us. That first night I stared at him for a few wordless moments before grabbing my pyjamas and dashing to the bathroom to get changed. When I got back to the room we were just as awkward, so he left and went to the bathroom himself while I sat down on the bed to wait. When he got back, we stared at each other for a bit longer, tense and ill at ease. We hadn't been together in the same place for more than a day since I went back to school, and to be thrown into this situation felt so odd; we still didn't really know each other, still hadn't had much time to talk. I thought Mum might have had some inkling of how we would feel and that was why she had given in with such good grace to the arrangement. I really had no idea how to approach Harry, and he was clearly as awkward as I was. In the end, I sighed in frustration, took his hand and pulled him down to sit next to me.

'Why don't we just sleep, Harry? This has been a weird day, and ... and I just want to sleep.'

He relaxed visibly, and nodded. We climbed into the bed, and curled up together, the way we used to when sharing a couch in the common room. The sigh I let out this time was contented. No matter how weird it was to have my parents aware of us together in one bed after all Mum's outraged comments on the subject, it still felt right to be here with Harry.

'Aha! Caught in the act!' George shouted as he burst through the door next morning; Bill and Charlie close behind him, both grinning madly.

I peered up at him through gritty eyes, while Harry sat up, startled. 'Think again, prat,' I said to George. 'And what'd you have to wake us up at the crack of dawn for anyway?'

'Because we wanted to interrupt your Christmas shag, but you are disappointing to say the least.'

'Still fully clothed and all,' added Charlie. 'Guess I win the bet then.'

'Get out of here, if you know what's good for you, you gits! Go bother someone else.'

'Oh, don't worry, we will.' George grinned evilly as they all backed out the door.

Christmas Day itself was really weird. That sense of double vision I'd had when returning to Hogwarts also hit me that day. On one hand it was the same sort of joyful, boisterous celebration that we'd always had. People laughed and cracked jokes. George played pranks, and after his morning visit a very red-faced Ron and Hermione emerged from Ron's room. But underneath it all was the gaping hole that no-one could ignore. George finally summed it up in a heartbreaking tribute to his twin before we sat down to dinner. Instead of making us feel maudlin, though, he conjured Fred in words so that it felt like he was sharing the time with us. It wasn't as hard as I had expected it to be and I got a feeling that one day, with time, we would heal as a family.

During the rest of that holiday Harry and I may have taken advantage of sharing quarters once or twice, but it certainly wasn't the shagathon that some of our life's chroniclers would have it. Sharing my room gave us more time to talk than we'd ever had before, and by the end of that short week we had a far more stable foundation for our relationship than we'd attained through all the snogging sessions over the summer, or in the floo conversations we'd had up 'til now.

I missed him fiercely as we headed off back to school, of course, but was happier than I had been last time, because I was far more secure in what we had together. The more time I spent with him, the more being together felt 'right' and the less important all the outside things became.


	8. NEWTs and Quidditch

7. NEWTs and Quidditch

My floo discussions with Harry were as numerous as ever, but they were as always frustratingly void of any depth. We talked about my lessons and my quidditch training, his auror training and his frequent interactions with little Teddy and Andromeda, but it was hard to really get to know someone over the floo. Your knees get sore if you're there for too long, and at Hogwarts there were always people around casting glares in my direction. Besides, as I've said many times before, Harry isn't the most open of people, and he wasn't going to spill his deepest dreams and fears to me when he was in my parents' kitchen and I was in a room that was shared by so many other people.

Around April, however, Hermione started hinting broadly that I needed to get off the floo more and do some study. I saw the sense of that idea, myself. Not because of the study, but because the big quidditch scouts still hadn't turned up and I was getting nervous about making the grade to go on professionally. I realised that studying for my NEWTs was important too, but while I did some it wasn't my focus that year.

While Harry was disappointed that I couldn't stay up as late talking, he knew what quidditch meant to me. Besides, his classes had gone from theory (which he had been pushed through rather faster than most because of his experiences and the need to get as many Aurors as they could out into the field in the aftermath of the battle) to practical field training missions. Every time he went on one, I was always restless and stressed until I had heard from him again. The memory of his body, cold and limp at Voldemort's feet, was my constant companion and I was never sure he'd be fine until I saw his head in the flames and could breathe again. It worried me that I felt this way, since I knew that if things stayed the same between us then someday in the future we would hopefully get married and he would be on these incredibly dangerous missions all the time. I didn't know if I could live with that sort of stress for the rest of his working life.

Ron had made it clear to Harry and Kingsley (as an aside, I have to say it's been very hard to be properly respectful to a Minister for Magic who I have seen looking dozy at the breakfast table on many a morning in the Grimauld Place days) that he was only helping George out with Weasley's Wizard Wheezes until he was back on his feet emotionally, though he never let that on to George. When we all thought George was ready to be alone with the shop, Ron intended to become an Auror too. George was getting better, but his pranks were still not the masterpieces they had been in the past, and his smiles still didn't reach his eyes. Ron had also been approached by Kingsley the day Harry had agreed to join, and Kingsley had promised him a spot whenever he wished to take it up. This meant that Hermione would soon have all the same worries that I did, so I figured she might understand if I approached her with my problem.

I sat down next to her one day once she had stopped frowning at the page of notes she was poring over, and handed her a butterbeer I had kept stashed from one of our Hogsmeade visits.

'Thanks,' she sighed, leaning back in her chair and relaxing a little. 'What's this for, though? You only break out the butterbeer when you're worried about something.'

'It's just, I feel like I'm going nuts.' I gave a big dramatic sigh, then smiled as the echo of my past self rose in the air. Oh, the amount of times I had sat in this very room and sighed out similar words to Colin over Harry.

She laughed, and said, 'well, that's a good opening. What are you nuts about, or do I even have to guess?'

I sobered immediately. 'It's Harry. Every time he goes on one of those stupid training missions I panic. I feel ridiculously anxious until the moment I hear from him again. If this is how it's going to be forever, I don't know if I can do it.'

Looking concerned she said, 'have you talked to him about it?'

'I can't. There's always too many people around and I don't want to look weak or clingy.' I stopped and frowned at my drink as if could solve my problems. 'I just ... I see him dead that day over and over and I can't stand knowing it could happen again.' I felt shaky just thinking about it.

Hermione came and sat down on the couch next to me, and gave me a hug. 'I know. I see it too sometimes. It's one of the memories that still eats at me in the middle of the night. But ... he's only gone for a few hours each time, right?'

'Yes, but these are real situations, even though they are just training drills. When it's the real thing I may not hear from him for days. Days of feeling this way would do my head in, I'm sure.' I was frustrated at myself, angry that I couldn't get past these emotions. Annoyed at myself, I ran a hand through my hair as I looked beseechingly at Hermione. 'What would you do?'

'Since Ron's job isn't particularly dangerous, if you discount the possibility of turning into a frog as George's idea of a joke, I really can't say I know what you're going through.'

'But, Ron is going to join the Aurors soon, right? Doesn't that freak you out?'

'Not really, at least not at the moment.'

'Maybe I'm just a freak then,' I said sadly.

'No you're not; you're just dealing with something none of the rest of us is. You need to talk to Harry about this.'

'I know, but unfortunately back when it would have been possible I didn't know I felt this way.'

We talked about it a little more while the butterbeers grew warm on the table, but it all came back to having to talk, really talk, to Harry and I knew there were months stretching ahead of us before I'd even get that chance.

To take my mind off it, I concentrated my efforts on getting better at quidditch. I pushed myself harder and faster and longer than ever before. At the end of each practice session I was exhausted, but it kept me from worrying about Harry while I was up in the air. By the time the final game of the year was to be played, I felt like I was ready for everything the other team could throw at me. I also knew that this was the one the scouts must be at because they hadn't showed up before.

Walking out to the pitch I was a bundle of nerves, but these were good nerves. I knew that there was no way I could have done more, put in any more effort, to be any better than I was. If I wasn't selected, it was because I wasn't meant to play quidditch. As I kicked off from the ground, even those last minute nerves dissipated. In the air, everything became clear. Get the ball and put it through the hoop; that was all I had to do. Life on a broom was so simple.

The game itself was brutal. We were playing Slytherin and they really wanted to win this cup again. There was a lot of cobbing going on, and several fouls which were missed by the referee because the Slytherins were very careful only to foul us when the referee was looking the other way. Our team had been playing so well together, and training so hard, however, that even the very physical way the Slytherins were choosing to mark us couldn't affect the end result. Hoarse with screaming, we got ourselves back to the ground and were swamped by what seemed to be every Gryffindor ever to pass through the doors of Hogwarts.

After getting away from our many admirers (some of whom tried to get a little frisky, presumably on the basis of my reputation as an 'easy' catch), I made my way to the locker rooms, ready for a good long shower before joining my Housemates in the common room for the party that had already started even before we left the pitch. A few of the others were heading that way, but the majority of the team seemed to want to get upstairs and not worry about freshening up. As we got to the edge of the crowd, I saw a heartstopping glint of glasses, and thought for one breath taking moment that Harry had managed to make it to the match, even though today was one of his training mission days.

I shook my head to clear it of those thoughts. Harry was a long way from here, and me wanting so desperately to talk to him wasn't going to bring him here. I sighed and turned towards the lockers, and this time I really did see him. He was lounging next to the changing room, with a smug grin on his face. I could feel my own face stretch into a grin as I ran towards him. In something of a recreation of the infamous day we got together, I grabbed him and we kissed until we were both out of breath. Then I had a chance to really take in that he was here.

'I'm not complaining, mind, but ... how come you're here? I thought you had one of those mission things.' A slight frown crossed my face as I thought of it, but I don't think he noticed.

'Kingsley let me off. It's one we've done before and he said I didn't need practice on it.'

'What was it?'

'Camping and protection spells.'

I snorted, understanding why Kingsley didn't insist Harry should go to that particular training session. He'd seen more than enough camping to last a lifetime, and really didn't need the practice at casting those particular spells.

'So, since family and friends were allowed to this game, I decided to come see you play. You were amazing.'

I grinned at him. 'Thanks, I try.'

'I mean it.' His hand coiled in my hair and I smiled at him. 'You were good before, but that training's done you wonders. If they don't select you after that, they're completely mental.'

I could feel the smile slide off my face as I said, 'I don't think they were here, Harry. I think they decided to miss us out this season.'

'That seems odd,' he frowned and I could almost the wheels turning in his mind. 'They've never missed before. I wonder if they already have all the players they need.'

'I hope not, but if so I'll just have to keep practising and try out again next year. Can you wait just five minutes while I take a shower? I need to get out of this uniform.'

'I could join you,' he said hopefully, starting to head inside with me, but I pushed him away, laughing.

'No you couldn't. Not with my teammates here; just wait, I won't be long.'

When I came out, I asked if he wanted to go to the party in the common room, but he said he'd prefer to stay outside for a while.

We wandered around the grounds, and I knew I needed to talk to him about what had been bothering me, but it seemed such a shame to disrupt the peace and happiness of the day. However, before long, he had figured out that something was wrong. I couldn't help it, every time he mentioned one of his missions I got quiet and restless.

'What's wrong, Ginny? You've been tense ever since I got here. Is it the scout thing?' He had come to a halt when he asked me the question and there was genuine concern in his eyes as they searched mine, but I tugged on his hand urging him to keep moving. I found it easier to talk if I had something else to do, and focusing on my feet meant I didn't have to look at him while I told him my worries.

'No, well not just them. I feel silly feeling this way ...' I stopped talking and looked at him, unsure how to start this and finally decided to just come out with it. I took a deep breath and said, 'I worry about you when you're out on those missions.'

I chanced a sideways glance up at him and he was looking confused and a little worried. 'It's not that bad, really. We just practice things we might need in the future in controlled situations.'

'They're not that controlled, and they could go wrong ...' I trailed off as his look grew more concerned. 'Look, I know it's irrational and I know it's not that dangerous, and I know you're quite capable, but I still worry and it's driving me insane.' I could see him about to protest again, and rushed on. 'I mean ... it won't be practice forever ... and ... and ... you could get hurt again,' I finished in a small voice thinking that I sounded stupid. To my relief when I looked at him he wasn't looking at me like I was an escaped mental patient, but the worry and confusion in his eyes was almost worse.

We came to the place we had always thought of as 'ours,' the place we had spent so many wonderful hours by the lake, and I pulled him down to sit with me. Harry looked thoughtful and seemed on the verge of speech when we heard someone calling my name and our attention was dragged away from each other. I sighed. Once again, that talk wasn't going to happen. In a minute, Hermione came panting into view; she stopped when she saw who I was with, and tried to back away gracefully. It was too late, however; the moment had been lost and I knew that I should go back to the castle with her. Harry was due back to the Burrow for dinner and I really should go join that party, which was the reason Hermione had been hunting me.

Hermione and I walked him to the castle gates and watched as he apparated away before we headed back up to the common room to celebrate our victory. For me it seemed hollow because of the scouts and my aborted talk with Harry, but that wasn't the fault of my team mates, so I tried my best to enjoy myself. It didn't go well and I excused myself as soon as I could.

Fortunately, with NEWTs approaching so rapidly I had so much study to do that I had no time to dwell on my other problems. The exams arrived far too fast for my liking and I found myself sweating in the Great Hall with everyone else. Those taking their OWLs were doing theory in the mornings and their practicals in the afternoons. We were the opposite, and after the physically more demanding practical, I often found it hard to concentrate during the theory exams. Still, I thought I had done well enough to pass.

Hermione, of course, was totally stressed, and she made sure everyone knew all about her study and how badly she was sure she had done. We all rolled our eyes and ignored her. It was common knowledge among everyone that she was going to beat us all, so no-one had much sympathy for her insecurities. Luna was serene as usual; she just seemed to have drifted into the Hall and taken part without any actual impetus on her behalf, but she was also sure to have done well. She always did. Somehow her easy going attitude helped her and she never had any trouble with the coursework so in her mind the exams were just a way to share her knowledge with the examiners. I wished I could have had the same attitude towards quidditch but whenever I thought about it and remembered the lack of scouts a worm of fear would twist at me and I never quite convinced myself to be philosophical about it.

Sooner than I had thought possible it was the Leaving Feast, and then I was facing my last night at school. On one hand I was happy that it was over and I could be with Harry more or less every day, but on the other it seemed really sad that this was no longer to be my home. Looking around the Great Hall at the teachers' table and the chattering students at all the House tables, I was hit by a sudden bout of melancholy. It was weird that I had spent the whole year in a flurry of desperation to get away from Hogwarts and back to Harry, and yet now I was struck by a desire to stay here, hold on just a little longer to this last vestige of childhood. I hadn't received a letter from any of the quidditch teams, even though I had secretly held out hope that one would still come, and I had no idea what else I wanted to do with my life. When I left here next day I was going to be adrift and that was a scary thought.

Luna slid into the seat next to me and smiled cheerfully.

'It's a bit funny isn't it? Leaving?' I nodded, still feeling a little mopey and she added, 'cheer up. You get to start an exciting new life now. I'm going to be going to the jungle in Malaysia. Daddy's heard of a rare plant there that cures wrackspurt infestations. What about you guys?'

Hermione said, 'I'm going to be going into Magical Law Enforcement. I have a job as assistant junior secretary and they'll train me on the job. I'm quite excited actually. I'll be learning all sorts of new ways to help House Elves and other oppressed creatures.' She frowned a little. 'That is, that's what I'm doing so long as I get enough NEWTs to qualify.'

I giggled, knowing full well that there was no way Hermione would be failing any of her NEWTs. 'You'll be fine, Hermione. Me, I'm fancy free for now, not a care in the world and no idea what I'll be doing either.' I was putting a cheerful spin on my planless future for their benefit, but I wasn't at all as positive as I made out. Still, it was the last feast here so I shook off the negative thoughts and managed to enjoy myself.

That night the castle was thronged with students moving between the common rooms hugging each other and swearing that we would never lose contact. There was a party atmosphere which the teachers were in no mood to squash, so the visiting lasted well into the night. In fact, I'm sure there were some who stayed awake until dawn. The next morning we all left the castle for the last time by taking the little boats back across the lake. When we had arrived here they all held four students each, but this time we all had to take one each. It was a vivid reminder of how far we had come since that first day. I took one last, lingering look at the castle that had been the scene of so many memories, both good and bad, and then turned and faced squarely towards the far bank. It was time to look ahead and decide what I was going to do with my future.


	9. New Directions

Part Two: New Lives.

Chapter 8: new directions

It was nice to get home again after finally finishing school, but the sense of melancholy stayed with me. The anniversary of the Battle at Hogwarts had come and gone amongst some intense media attention. They had camped out outside the school for a few days around the date, and it had been really hard to concentrate on study and trying to have a normal life with them there reminding us. I mean, I was never going to forget the day; it remained seared in my memory. Fred's body in the Great Hall with Colin, Lupin and Tonks, the castle destroyed around us, Harry seemingly dead in Hagrid's arms. I thought about all of them constantly. I didn't need this 'day' to remind me, and the reporters just served to remind me of the many other articles that had run over the past year. Harry and I had continued to garner attention and supposition, though nothing quite as intense as the first stories that had run about us.

Even with the reporters and their maudlin memorial stories, the worst thing about that day was that I hadn't been able to share it with my family at Fred's grave. I hadn't been able to get away to go home, so I spent the day watching the vultures circle at the castle gates and sitting by the place where Fred had died. People had been very kind to me, as they had been to all those who lost family and close friends, but it wasn't like being able to be with my family ... with Harry.

Now, I was back at the Burrow and all of that seemed so far away. It was nice to be away from the public eye again and back with my family. Even so, the first thing I did was go visit Fred's grave. I needed to mark the one year passage of time somehow, and the simple gesture of putting a flower down and holding a whispered chat with him made me feel better. But I still felt adrift in the world. I had, without realising it, counted on playing quidditch when I left school. Now that my dream had been at least postponed, I had no idea what I was going to do.

Then there was the even more pressing need to have that talk with Harry. I had all these weird feelings swirling around in me that I knew came from no logical place, and yet they threatened to consume me. The first night back we didn't have a chance to talk, though. Mum was masking her sadness that her last child had left school by holding a huge 'graduation feast' for me. Everyone was there, from Hagrid to Luna, Andromeda and Teddy to Kingsley Shacklebolt. To be honest it was really overwhelming, and slammed home the idea that it really was over, this chapter of my growing up. I was no longer a child, for real this time. When I came of age I had felt liberated, but now I felt like I was on a precipice and someone had a stick in my back, pushing me off. What I needed, I realised with a grin, was a broom to catch me as I fell. It was just a case of figuring out what that broom was.

Harry nudged my foot and I pulled myself out of my thoughts and looked at him. He leaned a little closer. 'Are you okay?' he breathed in my ear.

Realising that my thoughts must have been plastered all over my face, I smiled at him as cheerfully as I could manage, and whispered back, 'I'm fine. Just got lost in some thoughts.' He gave me a last searching look before turning back to his own food.

Despite what I'd said to Harry, my weird melancholic feeling persisted, and after dinner I slipped off by myself to think about things. I found myself down by Fred's grave again. This time, bathed in moonlight, it looked serene and I felt a strange sense of rightness there. It fit with my moroseness.

'I thought I'd find you here.' Harry's voice was warm, and I turned to smile at him as he sat down beside me. I tucked myself into him and revelled once again in the realness of having him here with me, his heartbeat a steadying force on my troubled thoughts.

'I needed to think. Mental, huh, since I just got home.'

'No, not mental.' He brushed the hair off my face, and said, 'but there's something wrong. You don't seem yourself.'

'It's everything and nothing, and I can't explain it.' I huffed out a frustrated sigh. 'Mostly I feel weird that school's over and I have to 'do something' with my life.'

He laughed, and I felt it buzz through me, relaxing me even more. 'I had so much going on when I left school that I didn't even think about it, and after the war ... well, I already knew what I was going to do, what I wanted to do.' He paused, then said, 'I'm no help, I'm sorry.'

'No, you are. I know what I want to do, but I can't,' I said, feeling plaintive. 'All I want to do is play quidditch, and now that I can't, I just don't know what to even think about ...' I sighed. 'But being here with you is making it seem less of a problem.'

I felt the warm rumble of his laugh again, and melted into just being with him. We stayed that way, not talking, just being together, for a few minutes before Mum came and found us, calling me back to the party which was, after all, in my honour. Strange though it was, just admitting to Harry that I was worried had eased the worry I felt. Something would turn up; something would be hovering ready to catch me as I fell. I just couldn't see it yet.

The party stretched for hours and when we went to bed, it was far too late to even think of getting into my issues with Harry and his training. I lay in bed with him, listening to the cadences of his breathing as he slept and I wished it could all be the way it was out at Fred's grave. When I was with him, nothing seemed to matter as much, but now that they'd been awakened, the nameless fears swarmed in as soon as we were apart again and I almost suffocated under them until I saw him. He snuffled slightly and turned over, throwing an arm over me as if he had sensed what I felt and was getting closer, reassuring me. Even though it had been only a week that we had ever spent the night together, I had missed it when I was back at school. That first night after the battle, when we had stayed together on Mum's tatty couch, hadn't been a fluke; the night really did seem to close in when we were together like this. I smiled and drifted off to sleep myself, knowing that somehow we would make this work out now that we were together again.

I have to say that even all these years later, I still sleep better when he is there with me, and it has nothing to do with me being worried about him being away on dangerous missions. No matter what separates us, I always feel like something is missing when he's not there. I guess everyone feels that way about their spouse, but I had been unprepared for the immediacy and depth of the 'rightness' of how it felt.

The next day, I was determined to have that talk with Harry. I didn't like feeling so afraid when he was away, and I needed to figure out why I felt the way I did, and what, if anything, we could do to work through it. Before I could lose my nerve, I dragged him outside after breakfast. It was one of those glorious summer days where the air seems hazy even that early, and it was enough to dispel some of the gloom I'd been brooding under.

Much as I was tempted to go back to Fred's grave, I decided that it would be better to be somewhere less morbid for what I knew would probably quite a tense conversation. Without really thinking about it, I drew him back to the place where we'd spent the afternoon on my birthday last year. This time the sun was less hot, though the air was hazier, and the sky was a much more vivid blue, yet I know we were both recollecting that day. Harry grinned sheepishly as I pulled him down beside me, and I cuddled into him, once again enjoying the sense of aliveness he brought to me when we were together. We leaned together back against a tree trunk, basking in the rays from the sun.

After several long moments, I sighed. He tensed, sensing something coming. I took his hand in mine, and began tracing patterns along his knuckles to make it easier to say what I needed to. Once again, touching him made it easier and I made sure to keep hold of him while we had this conversation.

'I need to talk to you, Harry.'

He shifted uncomfortably, but I could feel him nodding. He relaxed a little as I kept playing with his fingers, but he was still on edge.

'You remember when I said I worried about you doing your missions?'

'Yeah.'

I took a breath and rushed out with what I wanted to say. 'I'm still worried, Harry. Every time we're apart it eats at me.'

'But it's not ... I mean, I'm not ... It's safe.'

I sighed in frustration. 'I know that, Harry. Logically, I know it's safe, but ... Merlin, I'm rubbish at this.'

This was a harder conversation to have than I had expected. In the bright light of day, in this spot where so much had happened, my fears seemed insignificant and baseless and yet they overcame me whenever I was apart from Harry.

'I think – I think something went weird in me when I saw you dead. No, don't say anything,' I said as he opened his mouth to speak. 'I know you weren't really dead, but we all thought you were, and besides, even if you came back, you still did ... die, I mean.' I shuddered as I though about it, clutching his hand tighter in mine. 'I see you there every time I close my eyes, every time you're away from me and I know it would kill me to see it again – for real this time.'

I've looked back on this scene in the pensieve a good few times and every time I see the colour his face goes when I say that to him it cuts me to the quick. From this perspective, I want to reach out and hug him, but back then I needed a hug myself. The only good thing about it is that through the whole thing, I kept on tracing that pattern on his fingers and we stayed locked together.

'I had to, Ginny. I had no choice.' He wasn't looking at me, but there was an immense hurt in his voice, and I hated myself for doing that to him, but he had to know. I couldn't live a lie and I couldn't let him live one either.

'I know. I'm not blaming you, Harry, please don't think that.' My voice broke as I carried on. 'I just – I lost Fred, Harry, and it almost killed me. I can't bear the thought of losing you again, too. I can't stand knowing that you'll be out there all the time and ... and that you could never come back.'

'Do you ...' He paused and took a deep breath before continuing. 'Are you saying that you want to break up?'

I twisted around and glared at him. 'For Merlin's sake, Harry, what would give you that idea? Of course I don't want that,' I huffed, my grip on his hand getting tighter as if to stop him from getting up and leaving right then. I was irritated with him for once because he was being so damn thick about this. 'You are never going off to be noble without me ever again, is that clear? I just ... need you to understand how I feel and, I don't know, work out a way to deal with this.'

His body, which had tensed up when he asked me that question, began to relax again, and I looked up at him. His face was a mask. He was keeping his thoughts locked inside, and that was never going to do either of us any good. I stared at him, watching tiny flickers of emotions cross his face, trying to trace what he was thinking and willing him to say something. He finally looked at me and the expression in his eyes was heartbreaking.

'I could give it up, Ginny. If it worries you this much, it's not,' he swallowed, 'it's not worth it.'

I sat up, shocked, still looking him in the eye. 'No! You can't! I'm not pandering to this – whatever this is. You can't give up your dream.'

'But, I also can't stand to see you like this. I've noticed it ever since you got home; I don't want to be the one to do that to you.'

'But it's not you. It's me; it's the stupid broken thing in me. I feel like normal people wouldn't be this way. Other people are Aurors and their wives and husbands don't freak out every time they're apart. So why am I?'

He pulled me back down to lean against him, and this time it was Harry who took my hand and traced the patterns on my knuckles. 'I don't know, Ginny. But I do know that we can get through it, whatever it takes.'

I could feel his breath warm on my ear, and I smiled. Being here was again making things seem less dreadful. In a way, just letting it out there, just telling him that seeing him dead had torn me apart, had calmed something in me. I could still feel the fear swirling, waiting to return when he went into the field again, but it was less intrusive than it had been even yesterday.

'I don't like it, feeling this fearful. I used to be so strong, and I feel weak and powerless whenever you're out there.'

'You're still strong, Ginny. Having fears doesn't make you weak; it's giving in to them that does that. That's something I learned the hard way.' He turned serious eyes on me. 'Can I tell you something?' I nodded, feeling the rough texture of his shirt on my cheek.

'I don't know if it's as intense as yours, but I worry every game you play.'

I opened my mouth to say something, but he pressed on. 'I know you're good ... great, even. But I also know you're a target for the other teams, and ... well, I worry that you'll get seriously hurt.'

'You never let on.'

'I know; it wasn't worth my life after the bollocking you gave me last time I tried to say anything.'

His voice was light and teasing, and it drew a reluctant chuckle from me. Just hearing that he felt some fear too eased my mind.

'I think it's something you live with when you're in love. I bear it better when I see you play, but when I'm away there's always this worry that I'll get an unwelcome owl.'

Once again, I sat up and looked at him. It was obvious he realised what he'd said just as I stammered, 'in ... in love?'

He blushed. 'I didn't mean to say it like that; it just slipped out.' He looked a little anxious as he stammered, 'I do mean it though.'

Taking pity on him, I said, 'I love you too, Harry.' I brushed his lips with mine. He was just deepening the kiss when I felt a peck on my hand. I broke away and looked down, puzzled. A large tawny owl was looking at me, head cocked to the side, with its leg held out for me to take the official-looking letter tied there.

'Harry, pinch me please.'

'Why?'

'Because that's Holyhead Harpies stationary, and I want to be sure it's real.'

He laughed, then reached out and took the letter from the owl, giving it a fond pat as he did so. When the bird had flown away again, he held the letter out to me.

'I can't look. You read it for me, please.'

Harry shook his head and forced the letter in to my hand. 'No, you need to see it first.'

I slit the envelope open with shaking hands, and was barely able to make out the first lines.

_Dear Miss Weasley_

_It is my great pleasure to offer you a place with our team, the Holyhead Harpies, for the coming year. We will be running a two-week camp to introduce our new players ..._

I squealed, and threw my arms around Harry's neck, unable even to finish reading the letter in my excitement. His laugh rang out as I knocked him to the ground in my enthusiasm.

'I'm going to play quidditch! I'm going to play _quidditch_! I'm going to _play_ quidditch, and ... Merlin, Harry, I love you so much!' This time, no owl interrupted us and it was many minutes before I had composed myself enough to look at the rest of my letter. Harry and I pored over it for the rest of the morning, and then hurried in to let the rest of the family know at lunch time. It looked like I had found the broom that had been hovering out of sight in my life and I felt all my previous melancholy melting away. Starting this new life suddenly looked fun rather than daunting.


	10. The Harpies

Chapter 9: The Harpies

A few weeks later when I walked into the Harpies' headquarters my excitement reached a new level. I had read the letter more carefully when I had calmed down and saw I was one of five new recruits who had been chosen as reserves for this coming season. We all arrived at around the same time, and were shown into the large meeting room. It was clearly a busy place. There were piles of parchment lying everywhere, squashy armchairs with discarded pieces of clothing were scattered around the room and a pensieve had been set up on one wall. I guessed that was a way for them to watch their training sessions and games. I stopped myself short – _our_ training sessions and games, I thought with a smile. I caught the eye of one of the others, a tall willowy girl with dark brown hair, and she smiled back looking a little shy.

I sat down on one of the chairs and the other girl sat down near me. We were just beginning to shuffle a little in that way you do when thinking about starting a conversation with a stranger when our attention was caught as a new person entered the room. Gwenog Jones was noticeable anywhere; even if I didn't know who she was I would have known she had some authority here. She held herself with poise, almost arrogance, and had a knack of drawing all eyes to her. She stood at the front of the room and it was obvious our induction was about to begin.

'You have all been selected because we have seen that you are the best of the best coming out of the schools and sports academies,' she began and I frowned in puzzlement. I knew that no-one from the clubs had been to any of our games last year so I didn't know what she was talking about. I can't have been the only one looking confused because Gwenog flashed out what I was soon to know was her signature grin. 'We sent scouts in the form of ordinary spectators to your games, and watched you all in the pensieve. You represent the best chasers,' she nodded at me and the dark haired girl I had ended up next to, 'beaters,' with a glance at a stocky girl on the other side of the room, 'seekers,' this time she grinned at a tiny woman who seemed to disappear into the chair she was on but who grinned back in a familiar way, 'and keepers,' she nodded at a solemn looking blonde who nodded back. 'You will find these next two weeks very challenging. We will do our best to break you, since it is important that you are challenged as much as possible as soon as possible.'

I shuffled uncomfortably, and noticed most of the other girls doing the same. I had known that it was going to be tough, but to be told so matter of factly by the team captain that they were going to try to break us was a little disconcerting. She grinned, having expected this reaction, and said, 'it's not all bad, ladies. We will also show you how we have fun here at the Harpies. Now, I know some of you have left boyfriends behind.' I was feeling even more uncomfortable now. I had a strange feeling she was talking to me here. 'Because of our role as the only all-female team in the league, we have a certain reputation among the men, which we strive very hard to dispel. So, part of your job, and one of the things you signed to when you signed your contracts, is that you will keep your own reputations as unblemished as possible. That means,' and here she caught and held my eye, making me blush, 'that anyone the media is particularly interested in will have to work twice as hard to avoid unpleasant stories.' She turned back to the rest of the girls, looking at them one by one. 'So, those of you with boyfriends at home, you will do your best to avoid any scandals or any sort of attention that will harm our reputation. Those of you without boyfriends will also be discreet and careful about those with whom you choose to associate.' She grinned around the room once more, clearly enjoying our discomfort. ' Now ... time to get to work. Marcela will show you where you will be sleeping during this training period, and you will meet us on the pitch in thirty minutes.'

I gathered my things and followed the indicated girl out of the room. The girl I had been sitting near, the other chaser, caught up with me and held her hand out. I took it, and smiled self-consciously. There had been a certain amount of attention directed my way as people wondered why I would generate more media attention than the other recruits, so I was a little suspicious of why this girl was approaching me.

'You're Ginny Weasley, aren't you?' She was looking at me with awe, which wasn't the reaction I had expected.

'Yes.'

'I'm Gertrude Hightower. I'm a chaser too. I was at the sports academy in France for the last two years, so I missed all the unpleasantness here, but I hear it was terrible.'

A shadow crossed my face as I nodded, and she clapped her hands to her face. 'Oh, I forgot! You were involved, like right there, weren't you? And your brother ...' she trailed off as she noticed the expression on my face.

'Look, I really don't want to talk about this,' I made my voice as forbidding as I could, and she took the hint, but she was still fascinated by my life and peppered me with questions.

'Are you really going out with Harry Potter?'

I couldn't contain the smile that slid on to my face as I nodded again, and ducking my head in an attempt to hide the extreme sappiness from her. She grinned at me, undeterred. 'Oh that's so cute. You really like him, don't you? I knew those stories must be a load of bull.'

I grimaced wryly and said, 'yeah, well ... Rita Skeeter was never known for letting accuracy get in the way of a good scandal.'

She snorted and agreed with me. By this time we had reached the room assigned to us and Marcela was waiting patiently for Gertrude and me to catch up with the rest. We had all been assigned to the same room and the five beds were set along one wall opposite a large mirror. I wondered why we needed such an extravagant item when Marcela said that the mirrors were useful tools to check our posture and placement on the broom; they were spelled to tell us when we dropped out of proper form. Our quidditch stuff was already in lockers at the end of our beds, and the other girls were already struggling into their practise gear. We had all been provided with several sets of robes in the Harpies' colours, and we were unused to the new style which was a lot sleeker then the old robes I'd worn at Hogwarts. This really was a different league. I could feel excitement coursing through me as I looked at myself in my new clothes.

When we were out on the pitch, the other Harpies were as good as Gwenog's word and challenged us all as soon as we took off. It was, without a doubt, the most gruelling quidditch I have ever played. They kept us in the air for hours, never once letting up on the bludgers and the quaffles that came at us, nor with the fouls they repeatedly made against us. Instead of feeling intimidated and defeated by these tactics, however, I felt exhilarated. Every time I was pushed harder and faster, I thrilled to it. _This_ was what quidditch was supposed to be, and I knew that this was what I wanted to do with my life. If they were trying to break me it hadn't succeeded. All they had done was fire me up even more.

At lunch that day I was still buzzing from the practice and I saw the other girls seemed to feel the same way. Gertrude, who insisted on being called Gerry, and I ended up sitting next to each other at lunch and we shared a little more with each other. She had been schooled at home by her mother who had used to teach at Hogwarts when my brother Charlie was there, and had gone to France immediately after she finished school two years ago. So she was fascinated with my stories of life at Hogwarts and what it had been like especially during the year it had been run by the Death Eaters. She had a horrified fascination for how awful the teaching had been, and she loved the stories of the DA and standing up to the authorities. In return, I was obsessed with finding out what life had been like at the sports academy. She had trained six days a week in all weathers and had extensive theory lessons as well. I was a little concerned that I wouldn't measure up despite the hours of practise I had put myself through. But I decided I had been chosen just like she was, and I determined to keep doing my best. Gerry might have had a head start but I could catch up. In fact, I was determined to.

That afternoon comprised of a long test that quizzed us on all aspects of the game, players in other teams and their strengths and weaknesses. To my relief, as I surreptitiously looked around the room, everyone seemed as stunned as I was by the depth and detail required in the questions. Immediately after the test, when we thought we had some free time, we were sent back to the practice field for some drills which were just as gruelling as the morning's session had been and which left me gasping for breath when we were finally allowed back onto the ground. At last we were finally allowed some free time, and we all sank thankfully into our beds and vowed not to stir ever again.

Every day followed the same pattern, except that on subsequent days instead of doing a test we were all individually assigned research to do based on weaknesses that had been found in our knowledge based on the test. I was nowhere near the best of the new recruits (that honour went to the tiny seeker, Meredith Gibbs) but I was relieved to see that I wasn't as abysmally poor as I had thought I might be. My weakest area was my knowledge of the other teams' players and their foibles so I was assigned a lot of time in the pensieve with memories of games they played and told to find the weak points of opposing players and figure out ways to exploit them and how to negate any strengths I saw. It was fascinating watching these players. At first glance they seemed so amazing, just like they had when I idolised them all those times I'd watched the games, and yet when I looked closer I saw that one favoured his right side when throwing the quaffle or that another always used the same combination of moves to 'throw off' her opponents. There were always small things that I could see and I had fun coming up with tactics to use against them.

In a kind of dizzy disbelief, I imagined playing against these people and what I would do to avoid the bludgers sent by one beater, or how to get a goal in past another team's keeper. Gerry felt the same. By the end of the first week we were firm friends and we both felt the same kind of awe that we were actually at some point going to be on a field against these people. It was almost more surreal than the fact that we were here being brutalised on the field day in and day out by Gwenog and the other Harpies.

True to their word, however, they also showed us the kind of fun the Harpies had. It seemed to involve a lot of firewhiskey and bawdy jokes. But they were right; it was fun and cemented bonds between the new players and the old hands. By the end of the fortnight I was sad to leave. It had been extremely hard work and I had been exhausted beyond belief at the end of almost every day, but I felt like I belonged here, in this groups of dedicated women, and I knew once and for all that this was what I wanted to do. They had a party for us on the last Saturday, and guests were welcome. I invited Harry, of course, and he caused something of a sensation when he walked in. That he would come wasn't a surprise to them (by the end of the first day every single person at the headquarters knew we were together) but I think actually seeing him still came as something of a shock.

I was talking to one of the older girls at the bar when the feeling in the room changed. Conversations slowed and people became a little tense. I turned, puzzled, to see what was going on and saw Harry. He caught my eye and grinned, making his way through the crowded room, trying his best to ignore the whispered comments that followed him. Mindful that I was in a place where I had a reputation to uphold, I hugged Harry enthusiastically and dragged him down to sit with the group that had suddenly sprung up at the bar. He remained the centre of a fascinated group for the rest of the evening, but he took it pretty good naturedly even when talk drifted perilously close to the articles Rita had written about us. The frown he wore when redirecting attention put people off (he can look pretty off-putting when he's angry) and talk drifted back to safer subjects.

At the end of the night I walked him outside to the apparition point.

'I'm sorry they were so eager to talk to you, Harry. I should have thought about it a bit more.'

'It's OK. They were refreshingly blunt with their questions.' I looked at him in surprise. 'My fellow aurors always beat around the bush when they want to know about any of the things I've done or about you.' He grinned. 'It was quite fun to be asked right out what it was like to kill Voldemort.'

I sniggered, remembering the question from one of the drunkest girls in the room. She was almost certainly too drunk to remember any of the silly things Harry made up about that day and he had managed to direct attention away from the question. I figured he must have had some practice himself; he never used to be that good at sliding out of unwanted conversations.

'Well, either way you were a hit. You should drink firewhiskey more often. It loosens you up quite nicely.'

'Well, it did wonders for you too. Or is it just being with these Harpies that made you bubble over so much?'

'I think it's more likely the effect of seeing you again after two weeks apart.' I had been with him all evening, and after a little firewhiskey I had mellowed enough to risk sitting snuggled to him and had been relieved that Gwenog didn't seem to mind. In fact, she had been similarly snugly with a very good looking man of her own.

Now that we were alone, however, I took the opportunity to say a thorough goodbye to him, and sent him off back to the Burrow with the happy knowledge that I would be seeing him the next day. Returning to the party, I was accosted by Gerry who was in raptures over Harry.

'Oh, Ginny, he is so adorable,' she said passing me another firewhiskey. 'I thought he would be all forbidding and intimidating. You know, the 'Boy Who Lived' and all that, but he's not.' I choked on my drink at the thought of Harry as forbidding, and she grinned at me. 'I can see why you like him – and not just because he's famous.' I stuck my tongue out at her, used by now to her bluntness. I had let slip to her that I had a 'thing' for him when I was eleven and she now took every opportunity to tease me about it. 'And he's just as head over heels as you are, which is good. I was worried you were too sappy for your own good, but it's obvious he's just as bad.'

I took a swipe at her, which she ducked away from. 'Watch who you're calling sappy, witch! Don't forget I've heard on the floo to your bloke.'

Giggling, we both made our excuses to the other Harpies and made our way to bed where we continued the banter. I was sorry to leave her the next day, but as we would be practicing every week day even if we weren't staying overnight at the complex anymore, I knew I'd be seeing her and the other girls soon enough. My thoughts turned instead to my family and Harry and how excited I was to be going back to see them again.


	11. Beetle Attack

Chapter 10: Beetle Attack

The sight that greeted me when I got home from my training camp wasn't the welcoming image I had conjured in my mind during the exhaustion of the last two weeks. I'd expected a welcome committee at the very least, but instead what I got was:

'Oh, Ginny. Good, you're here. Could you help get this stuff over to the floo? I'd never have thought one person had this much stuff.' Mum bustled through the Lounge on her way to the kitchen, carrying what seemed to be a really strange bunch of things.

'Stuff? Is someone moving out.' My eyes narrowed as I watched a very familiar bedspread join the pile, and I noticed a few more odds and ends that had, until today, sat in my bedroom. 'That's Harry's stuff. What's going on, Mum?'

'Oh, Harry and Ron have got a flat together, dear, and they need to move today. Or ... well, they've decided that it has to be today.' Mum absent mindedly wiped her hair off her face, leaving a trail of dust smeared on her forehead.

'They're leaving? Why?' I could feel panic rising in me and tried to push it away and act rationally about this when what I really wanted to do was run howling upstairs and demand from Harry what in the bloody hell he thought he was doing.

'Ron says they got a good deal on the rental for it, love.' Her brow wrinkled a little. 'They swear it's not because they're sick of me.'

I grinned at her, trying to ignore the weird swirls roiling around in my tummy. 'Of course they're not sick of you. And you know they'll be back for food and laundry as soon as they know what living alone is like.'

I looked at my pack and at the large piles of things lying around cluttering up the area. 'Just let me put my bag away and I'll be right down to help.' _After I find Harry and make him explain this lunacy_ I added in my head.

I took the steps two at a time, and flung open the door to my bedroom. Sitting on my bed with a sheepish expression was a certain black-haired young man. I glared at him.

'You've heard, then?' he asked.

'Um, yeah. It was a bit hard to avoid what with the enormous piles of your stuff lying all over the kitchen floor.' I was trying very hard to keep the accusation out of my voice but I'm not certain I was completely successful. 'I just wish you'd told me yourself, rather than letting me be blindsided by Mum when I got back here.'

'You're not mad?'

'Not mad, exactly. I think ... I guess I'm a bit hurt you didn't say anything to me but I understand why you're moving out. Actually, scratch that,' I glared at him again, still standing in the doorway with my arms crossed in front of me. 'I'm _really_ hurt you chose not to talk to me about this, and if you don't have a good excuse I will be bloody angry.'

He looked panicked, and rushed out his explanation so fast it was almost impossible to make out the individual words. 'I was going to say something last night, but I didn't want to ruin your party. Then today it all happened so quickly.' He stopped, hesitated, then added, 'I did think – you might come too.' His eyes as they met mine were beseeching

I relented and smiled at him, sat down on the bed then took his hand. 'I can't. You know it would kill Mum to have too many of us leave all at once. Besides, I've lived with Ron. Without Mum's input he's terrible; you'll be begging to come back here in days.'

His face had fallen when I said I'd be staying at home, but he dragged a smile onto his face when I said that last part.

'He wasn't so bad at school,' he said, then added in a softer voice, 'I'll miss you.'

'Should have thought of that before you came up with this fool plan,' I teased, then laughed at his expression. 'Don't be an idiot. I may stay here with Mum and Dad, but I'll still visit you --lots.'

He grinned, reassured. 'This doesn't get you off the hook for not telling me though,' I added with a wink. 'I'm going to take a look at George's new products I think. Find something suitable – something that will hurt, I think.' The panicked look on his face almost made not being told worth it and I grinned at him as I left the room to help Mum.

In a surprisingly short time the boys had all their things in the kitchen and were ready to send them to their new place. Harry and I went through the floo and waited for Ron to send their belongings through after us. At first glance the place was pretty ugly, and it was far smaller and dingier than I knew Harry could afford. I glanced at him, shocked at the home he had chosen to live in, but he was lit up as he stared around at it.

'Isn't it brilliant?' he asked happily. He took my hand and dragged me further into the room. 'Look, over here we'll have the table, and here we can keep the couches. I got a great deal on one that's just like the ones in the old common room, and here ...'

I grinned at his enthusiasm even as I was being pulled around all the empty spots. Seeing it with his eyes it really wasn't that bad. It did have the same sort of shabby coziness that the Gryffindor common room did, and I could understand why that would appeal to Harry. It appealed to me too.

'It's nice, Harry. Real, um ... homely.'

He laughed. 'It's not much, and it's a bit dingy but it suits us. Besides, you know it's going to be orange within an hour of Ron getting here.'

I giggled, imagining the chaos when Ron had a whole house to paper in Chudley Cannons colours. Just then, the pile of things I had last seen in Mum's cheerful kitchen appeared in the middle of the Lounge. If I had thought that it was small before, it was nothing to what it looked like now that the boys' things were taking up all the available space.

There was a heavy knock at the front door and I squeezed my way past the mound to answer it, since Harry was busy flicking his wand and sending things flying towards one bedroom or the other. The man on the other side of the door was surrounded by a mountain of furniture.

'Delivery for a Mr Potter,' he said, consulting a shabby piece of parchment in his hand.

'I'll be right there,' Harry called, and I began to help the delivery man bring the furniture inside. By the time we had manouevered the first couch around the corner into the Lounge Harry had got all the clutter out of the way and spaces ready for the new arrivals. Ron had appeared in the floo, and altogether the space looked even smaller than before. The delivery many looked around him doubtfully before levitating the couch into the position Harry indicated by the wall.

Around the time that the last bed was in and Ron called out, 'Harry, where do you want these kitchen things to go?' the delivery guy, who had told us his name was Mike and kept up an almost incessant chatter as he worked, realised whose house he was in. I saw his eyes flick up to Harry's hair line; the scar happened to be visible because his hair was stuck together with dust and sweat from the moving. Mike's mouth dropped open and he turned to look at me with a glance that was calculating. Harry saw the look and his open manner immediately became frosty, and he quickly came and stood next to me. Mike looked between us, gulped a little and handed over a parchment for Harry to sign off on the delivery.

I knew that either Mike must have remembered the old stories about me or that someone was raking it up again. I didn't keep track of every time Rita Skeeter's old articles were dragged up, but I could always tell because I started getting those little sideways glances again. I didn't let it worry me; the comments were usually innocuous and it always blew over pretty quickly. That afternoon as I was walking past a wizarding newsagent, however, I saw something that made my mouth drop open in horror.

I stared, ashen faced, at the newspapers lining the newsstand, then apparated quickly to Harry's flat. I found him there with Ron, both looking furious as they read a copy of the _Prophet_ I had just seen. Harry looked up as I arrived, and immediately came over to me.

'You've seen it, then?' he said, taking my hand and leading me back to the couch. Ron was perched on the arm looking somehow both angry and anxious.

'Just the headline. It was enough.' My voice was hollow and I sank down next to Harry. The paper was lying on their coffee table, the headline blaring its message for all to read. _Potter Connection Almost Costs Harpies' Newest Player_.

'That's such crap. How would you cost the team a player?' My voice was plaintive again as I asked the question because I suspected what the answer would be.

Ron rushed in to say, 'Well, um ... Ginny, they ... er, mentioned those articles from _Witch Weekly_.'

'What the hell does that have to do with the Harpies?' I demanded, looking at Harry. 'How does me being with you affect the way I play?'

He glanced at Ron, and I knew he didn't want to answer me, but finally he said, 'It doesn't ... but it does affect your reputation and the team's reputation for choosing you.'

I stood up and started pacing, nervously running my fingers through my hair. 'Those bloody vultures. It's all bloody lies and yet it almost cost me my dream. I thought this was over, Harry. I thought we'd got past this. And ... oh, _Merlin_ what is Gwenog going to say? She specifically said I was to keep out of the papers for this sort of thing.'

'I'm sure they'll understand. I mean, this isn't new ... and it's not like it's your fault.'

Just then an owl arrived with an official-looking letter on Holyhead stationary. I cast Harry an 'I told you so' look before accepting the letter. The contents were much as I expected, telling me that I had agreed to keep my reputation blameless and that if something like this was to happen again I would be called to a disciplinary hearing with the team bosses. I shuddered at the idea of facing them all while trying to make this whole fiasco look reasonable. I sighed. I needed to find and talk to Gwenog and explain this whole thing to her. Next time I was at headquarters I was going to have to track her down. Harry read the letter over my shoulder and his lips compressed in what I had learned was his determined, angry look.

'I'm not taking this lying down. I couldn't get hold of Rita last time – she scarpered. But this time I know where she is and I am _not_ leaving it like before. They are not getting away with doing this to us – to you.'

He grabbed my hand, pulled me to my feet, and we apparated away from a startled Ron right into the back yard of the Leaky Cauldron.

I had regained some of my humour again. 'You're hunting that Skeeter woman in a pub? I like a drink as much as the next girl, Harry, but don't you think this is a bit much?'

He grinned and dragged me inside. 'She comes here every day at this time for her lunch. I bet, since she's not the author of this article just the reason for it, she won't be hiding from me this time. By the time she realises what's going on it'll be too late.'

By the end of this speech we were in the pub, and the dim mustiness and warm beery smell had already begun to calm me down. As my eyes grew accustomed to the light I spotted the over-coifed platimun blonde hair we were looking for. I took a deep breath, composing myself, and Harry led me towards her.

'Rita!' He grinned savagely as he spoke to her and she recoiled a little. 'It's real full in here, Rita, so we'd like to sit down with you if you don't mind.'

I'm sure Rita was less than thrilled with the idea, but she was also always after a new story so she held out a chair in a welcoming gesture. I was still wondering exactly what Harry was going to say to her but went along with him. I'd been longing for months to give this woman a piece of my mind and now it looked like I might have a chance.

Rita began right away. 'Harry! It's been far too long since we talked; I'm fascinated by your rise among the aurors. How would you like to schedule a little interview? We could run a series: Potter's post-You-Know-Who life...' Her eyes went misty as she thought about the possible length of her series of articles.

'I don't think so, Rita. See, when you messed with my girlfriend, you messed with me. I don't like it when people mess with me and my friends.'

'Oh, that silly little thing. No-one takes those things seriously you know.'

'You evil, lying cow,' I finally broke in. 'You knew that stuff was crap and you wrote it anyway, and a lot of people took it seriously enough. You almost cost me my career!' By the end I was almost shouting at her, and she looked a little taken-aback. Some of the other patrons were turning interested eyes in our direction. Maybe Rita had dismissed me as some spineless bimbo caught by Harry's fame, but she would learn. Harry squeezed my hand, and I forced myself to calm down again, though the eyes I kept on Rita glittered with hate.

'I write what the public wants to hear. They wanted a juicy story on Harry and I gave it to them. If you want the other side out there, grant me an interview and I'll tell your side.'

'Not bloody likely,' I ground out.

'You won't be writing anything else about me or Ginny, Rita,' Harry said in a low voice.

'I'll write whatever the public wants to read, Harry, and you can't stop me.' Rita's voice was sweet and light but there was an undertone of menace.

'I think I can, Rita. See, I'm friends with the Minister for Magic and people in Magical Law Enforcement. You might remember my friend Hermione Granger; she's working in that department now.' Rita shuddered when he mentioned her name, and Harry smiled. That smile is one of the most menacing things I've ever seen on his face. I know if I was Rita I would have been shaking just from looking at him. He carried on, 'I think the Minister would be really interested to hear about your animagus status. Or have you remembered to register yet?' The smile on Rita's face that had been fading through Harry's whole speech now vanished completely. 'I didn't think so.' Harry leaned back in his chair. 'I think we understand each other Rita. If you publish stories about me or Ginny again you won't like the results.'

Rita looked sick as we got up from the table. Harry made one last point. 'Another thing ... you really don't want to mess with Ginny. She's a bit like me – got a temper on her. But unlike me, she hasn't got many qualms about hexing people who get in her way.' He took my hand, and we turned to leave.

As we left, I looked back at Rita. She was sitting at the table and looked somewhat diminished from the person who had been there when we arrived. I felt a small stab of guilt. After all, she was just doing her job, but then I reminded myself that she had single handedly caused a huge scandal in my life, alienated half the school and almost cost me the career I so desperately wanted. All she had to do to avoid any unpleasantness was to register as an animagus, but I was pretty sure she wouldn't. So, all in all, Rita had pretty much brought it on herself. I smiled at her and gave her a small wave as she watched us leave the pub.


	12. Loving and Giving

Chapter 11: Loving and Giving.

After our little talk with Rita things really quietened down on the reporter front. Until then, there had always been some lurking around us and we'd see something written about one or other of us every week. Now, Rita seemed to have alerted her fellows that we were out of bounds. Perhaps she thought if _anyone_ wrote anything, Harry and I would carry through on our threats. We wouldn't, neither of us is that petty, but neither of us is noble enough to find her and put that detail to rights either. In fact, ever since then reporters have been far less eager to interfere in our lives. I have never understood why Rita didn't just register as an animagus, but she never did. I guess the lure of the sneaky story outweighed the worry that she would be exposed and sent to Azkaban. It's not the choice I would have made, but it highlights the fact that we're all different.

The fallout from the article that had dragged the Harpies' name into my affairs wasn't as bad as I had expected. I cornered Gwenog after one of our training sessions and explained to her. She was very decent and understanding about it, and laughed uproariously when I told her what Harry had threatened Rita with. 'I want to see this infamous hex of ours one day, Weasley,' was all she said, and just reiterated what the letter had said: that I wasn't to allow it to happen again. I felt much happier about my prospects in that direction since we'd shut Rita down so I stopped worrying and began enjoying myself again.

While I missed having Harry with me night and day, I was happy to be playing quidditch so regularly. Our days were long and always involved a mixture of playing together to come up with strategies, background theory on the other teams and detailed trips into the pensieve to revisit our practices. I had thought I was pretty good before, but slowly my reflexes got faster and I built up a lot more stamina and the way I played became much more fluid and intuitive. There had been a time when Harry was far better than I was, and I was pretty sure that if he'd gone out for a team he could have made the grade easily, but now after a few weeks of daily practice I thought I could give him a run for his money. If he wasn't so busy with his training and I wasn't so exhausted after the tough practices I thought about challenging him to a game – just to see.

I mentioned it to Gerry one day while we were flying chaser drills with the other Harpies. She rolled her eyes at me.

'Don't you get enough quidditch every day?'

'No way ... there's never too much quidditch, except I'm usually too bloody tired and he's usually out on missions anyway. Besides, I know he misses it.'

'He used to play too?'

'I'm shocked, Gerry. You read everything you can on him and yet you didn't know he was the youngest seeker in a century? You're losing your touch.' I grinned at her mischievously as I flew past her into the formation we were practising that day.

She threw a well-aimed quaffle at me which I had to roll on my broom to avoid and said, 'how's that for losing my touch?'

'I will get you for that,' I yelled as I sped up to chase her. For the rest of the session we kept up the good natured banter, but I didn't stop thinking about the idea of getting Harry back on a broom. I thought he would enjoy playing again and I began plotting how to make it happen.

My chance came one day at the end of weeks of training when Gwenog announced that we would be having a week off. The first game was coming up and we needed to rest a little before the final bout of intensive training for that day. I looked forward to it. For the first time in years, maybe the first time ever, Harry and I could do normal stuff together. He was at a point in his training where they were in the office every day and left for home at a respectable hour. There were none of Harry's late night training missions to get in the way and the idea of being like every other couple, like Ron and Hermione who had spent every day they could together for the past several months, was intoxicating. Well, I guessed that a one-on-one quidditch game wasn't all _that_ normal, but it would be more normal than the 'never seeing each other' that had slowly crept into our lives.

Now that I had finally finished school and been through my intensive training I could finally start living a life with Harry. By that I mean we were able to do things like other couples, working hard all week and seeing each other on the weekends except for those that Harry had his auror missions – and, of course, I would soon add getting him back flying to that list. That's not to say things in my life were suddenly perfect, but they were better than they had been up to now. I was still nervous when Harry went out and still worried about him excessively, but I was no longer paralysed with the fear. I know we had one or two 'talks' where I was as irrational as ever, but mostly I was able to let him go without much effort and even though I always let out a sigh of relief when he returned, I didn't feel so overwhelmed by the fear anymore.

Harry began taking me with him when he saw Andromeda and Teddy, and I was fascinated by the way Harry was with the boy. He took his duties as godfather so seriously that I became worried that he was projecting his own issues onto Teddy. Once or twice I caught him staring at the baby with a huge depth of sadness in his eyes. I cornered him one day when we were back at the flat. Ron was out, and the two of us were cuddled on the couch listing to the wizarding music show and just talking. Talk turned to Teddy and Harry once again took on that pensive, haunted look. I sat up a little and made him look at me. He smiled, but the smile didn't quite reach his eyes.

'Harry, what's wrong? You don't seem yourself.'

He tried to put me off. 'Nothing, I think I'm just tired. It's been a long day chasing after that kid. He can sure move when he wants to.' He grinned but it was a forced, unconvincing one.

I smiled at him, but didn't let him get away with it. 'No, there's something more than that. You're moping.'

He frowned at me. 'I don't mope ...' I quirked my eyebrow at him and he relented. 'Okay, okay! But I don't know what it is. Being with Teddy makes me feel kind of ... I don't know.'

'Sad? ' I supplied with a cheeky grin.

He grinned back, still with that indefinable something in his eyes. 'Yes ... but more than that. I just know what his life is going to be like and it bothers me.'

I sat up, shocked, and grabbed his hand. 'It's not going to be the same as your life, Harry! First, Andromeda is so madly in love with him and she spoils him senseless, and second, you'll never let him have the life you did. You know that.'

He sighed in frustration, and said, 'yes I know. But, I can't help thinking if Lupin and Tonks didn't get involved, didn't come to Hogwarts because of me ...'

I glared at him. 'This is not your fault, Harry. No-one blames you at all. Well, no-one except you.'

'Don't you think I don't know it, Ginny?' His eyes were angry now, and I was pleased to see it. That defeated look was gone with the blaze. 'I tell myself all the time that I didn't ask them to come, but I still can't help but feel that way.'

I thought about it for a moment, cuddling as close to him as I could because he was trying to close himself away again. I had been where he was now, I remembered. Back when Tom Riddle had his hooks in me I spent a lot of time blaming myself and thinking if only I was stronger ... if only I had resisted more then none of it would have happened. Back then, it had taken Harry sitting me down and showing sympathy to get me past it. I realised the place he was in now wasn't one that's easy to get out of alone. I hugged him tight.

'The thing is, Harry, you can keep doing this for the rest of your life, second guessing yourself. But it won't get you anywhere. The only thing you can really do is just keep on going, do the best you can and make sure that those who come after don't have to face those same feelings.'

'I guess.'

'I've been there, remember. I spent a long time analysing my actions in first year, blaming myself, but in the end it got me nowhere. I was only able to live again properly once I put it behind me – once you made me see sense and stop blaming myself.' I snorted. 'You and I are a right pair, you know. I don't think we'll ever have a normal life, what with my stupid fears and your guilt complex.'

He let out a shout of laughter and I was happy to see that it was real and unforced this time. 'At least they're complementary issues. You'll get worried and I'll feel guilty about it. It's perfect.'

I buried my head in his chest to stifle my giggles, and it was at that point that Ron came home with Hermione.

'Oi! How many times do I have to tell you guys not to do that while I'm around?'

'Grow up, Ron. You weren't around and anyway I'm a big girl now.' I grinned at him, 'you'll just have to live with this.' I kissed Harry thoroughly while Ron looked mutinous and Hermione smirked at us.

'Come on Harry, I think we'll be more comfortable in your room,' I pulled him to his feet and headed in that direction.

'I do _not_ want to know about that, you know that, Ginny.' Ron was shouting after us in a panicked voice, and I heard Hermione's more reasoned tones soothing him.

'There are silencing charms, Ron, and besides I can keep you occupied ...' I grinned at Harry again as Ron's protests were cut off.

'Thanks Hermione,' I called behind me. 'Hi, by the way. We really should catch up sometime ...'

I squeaked out a giggle as Harry firmly closed the door on the others before I'd done speaking. I wrapped my arms around him and leaned my head on his shoulder, breathing him in yet again. No matter how many times I'd been here and done this, I never got sick of holding him. Feeling him solid and alive was still so unreal, something I hadn't allowed myself to hope for all the time he was away in my sixth year and then I didn't get to do it anywhere near often enough in my seventh. This ... being able to hold and touch him whenever I wanted was still a novelty and I revelled in it every chance I got.

Hours later I prepared to head home. Mum was reasonably approving of our relationship, but she did like me to be home at night. It was quite frustrating and was one of the things Harry and I had small arguments about at times. I missed being with him during the night, missed holding him and hearing him sleep, and if he hadn't moved out we could still have had that. But I knew it was the right thing for him. He had never liked imposing on my family and it was only the force of my mother's will that had kept him at the Burrow for so long. Once Ron had decided to move out, Harry couldn't allow himself to be a burden anymore. It was one of those useless things he got all guilty about and since this one was easily removed by his moving out, he'd had no hesitation.

He watched me idly and said, 'I wish you didn't have to go.'

Tying my shoelaces, I said, 'I know. But you know Mum; she's not happy unless she knows I'm at home. I know all about irrational fears, so I do this for her.' I finished up and leaned over the bed to give him a kiss.

'If we were married, you wouldn't have to leave.' He said it so casually that I almost thought he hadn't realised what he'd said, then I noticed the intensity of the look in his eyes and the breath rushed out of me. I started shaking just like I had all that time ago when he'd broken up with me by the lake at Hogwarts.

'What ... what are you saying?' He pulled me down to sit with him on the rumpled covers, and looked me carefully in the eye.

'I think we should get married.' He saw the look in my eyes, and stammered out, 'not right now. I mean ... we have loads of time. But ... we should think about it. Decide when we'll do it.' He had an anxious, almost painful expression on his face.

'I ... well, of course I will, Harry. But I'm still only seventeen ...'

'Almost eighteen,' he said, his eyes searching my face.

I chuckled. 'Okay, almost eighteen ...' I trailed off as I realised the enormity of what he'd said. A grin broke out on my face and I threw my arms around him and his answering grin melted my heart. He had been worried and it made me sad that he really thought I might not want to marry him. I giggled internally. He clearly didn't know how long I had wanted this for, or how much time my ten year old self had spent planning the details of the wedding.

'Promise me one thing, Harry.'

'What's that?'

'If my ten year old self turns up with her ideas on proper wedding decorations, lock me away somewhere.' He looked quizzical and I fizzed over with giggles at the memory. 'I thought Gilderoy Lockhart was the epitome of beauty and sophisticated dressing, and I was a hopeless romantic. I don't trust myself not to have a relapse.'

He laughed with me, and said, 'I don't think we'll have that issue. I think we're more likely to have to fight you wanting to have it on brooms or at the Harpie's pitch.' A dreamy look stole over my face as I thought about getting married at the Harpie's headquarters and he laughed and said, 'see. Quidditch is your new romance. Just for the record ... I don't think it's a terrible idea, getting married on a pitch I mean.'

As I flooed home, I thought that this was one of the many reasons I loved Harry. His ideas were always off the wall and yet they suited me, suited us. A quidditch pitch wasn't a normal place to get married and yet – it would be perfect for us. Now, we needed to decide when we would tell my parents and how, and I also realised I hadn't set up that quidditch game between us. It was time to do a little more serious thinking about how I was going to accomplish both those things.


	13. Game Plans

_A/N: Sorry this is later than usual. I have a myriad of excuses (ranging from obsessively reading a new book in one of my other favourite series to starting to do NaNoWriMo again) and unfortunately this month late updates are likely because of NaNoWriMo and having to finish off my Ginny Big Bang story by the end of this month. I am intending to still write on this story, but it isn't my top priority so I will have less time with it. Things should be back to a normal 'one chapter a week' rhythm in December though. _

Chapter 12: Game Plans

I finally got Harry on the broom just a few days before the end of my training-free period. It was good to be playing quidditch just for fun again. Even though I loved training and playing professionally, there was a different type of fun to be had just goofing around. Harry laughed easily and seemed to enjoy the time together as much as I did so we stayed out there for hours, challenging each other to go faster and higher. He _was_ rusty in his skills, but quickly settled back into the ease of playing that we had achieved so long ago on the Gryffindor team together. By the time we came in to land we'd decided to make it a regular date.

In between all the time I spent with Harry, of course, I was still training really hard. The daily practices might have stopped for a week or two but it flew by really fast and before I knew it we were intensive training for the first big match of the season. Consequently Harry and I didn't really have a chance to discuss when we would tell people we had decided to get married. I had a sneaking suspicion that Mum would be fine with the idea; she had, after all, been wistfully intrigued with the idea two years ago. Still, how and when to present my family with the reality of the situation was puzzling, especially when my time with Harry was a little more curtailed due to the upcoming game. Still, I decided this was important so I cornered him one day before flooing home after practice.

'Harry? Are you around?' I called as I stepped out of the floo at the flat he shared with Ron. The place looked about as messy as I'd expected it to be with those two boys being in sole possession, with clothes scattered around and some torn and crumpled pieces of parchment amongst it all. I rolled my eyes and headed towards Harry's room. He was sitting in the middle of his bed, which was about the tidiest part of the room. His room was reasonably clean, well as clean as it can be when a house is lived in by two boys, but there was stuff everywhere. I sank down on the bed and gave him a quick kiss.

'You better make the most of this mess, you know ... when you live with me you're not gonna get away with having all this ... this ...'

'Crap?' Harry supplied with a grin.

'Yep, crap. Why don't you just banish it all to its place?' I flopped myself back against the pillows by his headboard.

'Well, if I did that I wouldn't be able to find anything.' He gave me a cheeky grin then returned his eyes to what he was working on.

I rolled my eyes and decided to move on. 'We need to talk, Harry.'

He had still been riffling through some parchments and sucking on a quill absentmindedly, but turned to me immediately when I said that.

'About what?'

'About when to tell my parents that we're going to get married ... and about when we might be thinking of doing it, because you know Mum will want to know every detail.'

He laughed and agreed. 'Well, I dunno. I don't think we need to do it any time soon. You know your Mum will want as long as possible to make as big a deal of it as possible.'

'Merlin, yes. She's going to go barmy.'

'I was thinking ...' he said hesitantly. 'I was thinking we could do it on an anniversary of the battle.'

I stared at him, slightly dumbfounded. 'But Harry, I really don't think people will go for that.'

'Well why not?' He grabbed my hands and looked at me with an earnest expression that was so ... so _him _and made me smile despite my reservations about what he'd just said. 'Everyone tiptoes around it, and it's a horrid memory. We're all still so focused on it as a bad day, why not do something to make it a better day, give it some better memories as well as the bad ones?'

'Well, for starters, there's Fred. I don't know if I can cope always having that rip in my heart when we have our anniversary.'

Harry gripped my hands tighter at the mention of the name and said, 'I know. I really do.' He dropped my hands and ran his hands through his hair, and struggled to work out what to say. 'I just feel that I was responsible for a lot of the pain that day ... I want to do something to counter that somehow.'

'You know what, Harry?' I was closing in on myself, and pulling back from him. 'That is one of the most selfish things I've heard you say.' He gaped at me and I continued, my voice getting higher and angrier as I talked. 'You're making it all about you – your guilt, your responsibility. Well, what about me? It will be my wedding too and you want me to wipe out memories of my brother's death just so you can make yourself feel better.'

'That's not what I meant. I don't want to wipe anything out; I know better than most that some things just can't be wiped out.' I winced as I thought about how he had lost his parents before he even really knew them. 'I don't think you'll forget Fred or anything, I just think ... maybe you could think about it as a way to have him there with us?'

I frowned at him. 'It's too soon for this, Harry. It's not much past a year since I lost my brother and it really does feel like you're trying to obliterate that.' He opened his mouth to say something and I rushed on to stop him. 'Don't you remember the castle, how we left a bit of it destroyed to show people what it was like? I feel like this is trying to do the opposite of that, and it's too soon ...' I trailed off plaintively. He looked at me, shock written plainly all over his face and I felt a twinge of guilt.

I remember saying in my last memoir that I missed fighting with Harry while we was away horcrux hunting, and that's still true. Those kind of big, shouty, unimportant arguments that light sparks _are_ fun. But I really dislike these ones where it's about real, deep important things and I hate feeling that distant from him. I think he sensed some of my discomfort because he stretched his hand out to me and said, 'You know what? You're right; I think it's maybe too early to think about this. We should,' he stopped, clearly casting around for the best way to say what he wanted to say, 'we should ... keep it to ourselves a bit. Not worry about when we're going to do it and when we'll tell people and just know it's going to happen.'

He was being so good about this that I felt even worse about the way I was feeling. As his hand caressed mine and I listened to him, I relaxed and the anger began to seep out of me. I thought for a few moments and said, 'I think that's a good idea. Besides, this way we get to be all secretive and unbearably smug about having a secret.'

He laughed, the sound unforced and joyful, and my negative feelings diminished completely. I knew, deep down, what Harry wanted and what he was trying to say. It wasn't his fault that he'd touched a raw nerve in me and that he has no finesse with words and so made it all worse. I smiled at him fondly, thinking that even though he could come across as a real reckless prat he is still a good person and always tries to do the right thing.

When to have the wedding itself was still unresolved, and I knew we were mostly avoiding the issue because of Fred, but Harry was right. The important part of all this was knowing that we were going to be married, and we had plenty of time. With both our careers just getting underway, neither of us wanted to get bogged down in details. It was enough for me, and I could tell for Harry too, to know that we were together, and that one day we agreed we would get married. No-one else needed to know and I relaxed further as I realised that it _didn't_ actually matter – it really was just a formalising of something that we already lived. The slight hesitation I'd felt when he'd sprung the idea on me out of the blue was gone, replaced with a burning joyful knowledge that we both wanted to be together forever.

I did think, however, that maybe I needed to butter Mum up to accepting me staying with Harry overnight sometimes. I couldn't imagine any sort of long wait before we could spend another night together. I didn't even want to wait until we were officially engaged for the world to know. This was something I was going to have to enlist Dad's help on, I thought. But I didn't have time right then to think about it in much depth.

Days flew swiftly past as the day of the first big game drew near. I knew there was very little chance that I would get onto the field this first game, since I was just a reserve, but I also knew that with the training we'd had I was ready to take my place if I was called on. Gerry was as excited as I was. There was something amazing about the idea of being pitch-side in uniform, in the players' viewing room, and cheering on my own team mates. We didn't even really care that we probably wouldn't be actively involved in the outcome of the game. The first string chasers, Lizzy, Francoise, and Aurora, were brilliant and playing with them had significantly increased Gerry and my skills.

The day of the game dawned bright and clear, perfect conditions for our team.

'Pinch me,' demanded Gerry as we arrived at the stadium. I complied, and she squealed. 'You weren't meant to take me seriously, Ginny!'

'I know, but it was fun,' I said with as innocent an expression on my face as I could devise. She aimed a swipe at me which I ducked away from, grinning.

'I can't believe it's really game day,' I said as we entered the changing sheds. This first game was, thankfully, at our home ground and so we didn't have to go travelling around the country. Another bonus was that we found our way to the changing rooms easily.

Gerry agreed and we managed to struggle into the skin tight uniforms favoured by Harpies management. I laughed when we were done. Gerry and I had been so excited about being here that we were early; no-one else was even in the changing rooms yet. I dragged her with me out the door so we could go to the viewing room, which was where we'd been instructed to meet once we were changed. We ran into a couple of the old hands as we did so and Gwenog, who was with them, laughed.

'Look at the eager little new girls,' her eyes twinkled at us as we laughed with the others. 'You'll soon grow jaded and want as much time away from this place as you can.' Gerry poked her tongue out on the way past, and Gwenog shooed us away saying, 'we'll meet you upstairs when it's actually time to be ready.' Still snorting, the team headed for the change room and Gerry and I made our way up to the very top of headquarters.

Passing the visitors' change room I saw a very familiar face in the corridor.

'Oliver?' I gasped out. 'I totally forgot you play for Puddlemere.' I took in his casual attire, and added, ' Are you playing today?'

'Yeah I am. How are you, Ginny? I haven't seen you since the day –' his face twisted as he realised what he was about to say.

'The memorial day at Hogwarts,' I supplied for him with a smile. 'I remember, and it's okay, Oliver, really. You don't need to dance around me.' I smiled at him and then noticed the very interested look Gerry was giving him. 'Oh! Whoops. Oliver Wood, Gerry Hightower. Oliver used to be quidditch captain at Hogwarts, Gerry, though he never picked me for the team.'

'Possibly because you never tried out when I was captain, Ginny. Don't let her fool you, Gerry; Ginny used to be very shy. I can't remember hearing a peep from her til we fought at Hogwarts together. Then, she was pretty loud.'

'I can't believe that, though she did tell me about the crush she had on Harry Potter when he was your seeker.'

Oliver's eyes went misty as he remembered his last year at school. 'He was a great seeker and finally helped us win the cup in my last year; I could do with having him on the team now, but he doesn't seem interested in playing ... it's funny that Ginny, here, was the one who ended up playing professionally, since I never had a chance to have her on the team , even though we were at school together for a couple of years ...'

I cleared my throat, as the two of them looked like they were getting ready to have a good old chat about me. I said pointedly, 'remember, Oliver is the keeper for Puddlemere, Gerry. He's the enemy.'

'I know,' Gerry laughed, 'I've had to study his moves in order to find the chinks in his armour. I must say,' she said turning to him, 'you have very good defensive moves, but I think I have one or two things up my sleeve you won't be expecting.' She began teasing Oliver good naturedly, and in the end I had to drag her away from him so we wouldn't be late for the team meeting.

'I'll see you after we crush you, Oliver,' I called as we began running to make it up the stairs in time. He headed into his team's change rooms, presumably still on time as no-one had come out to chivvy him along, and Gerry gushed to me about how cute he was all the way up the stairs.

I reflected as we entered the room that I must be getting better. Oliver's comment about Hogwarts and the memorial really hadn't bothered me at all. I wondered if I had maybe been a bit hasty when I told Harry I couldn't get married on the anniversary of the battle. It's not like we were planning on doing it next year. I had time to get used to the idea and move on a bit. Clearly I wasn't going to be traumatised forever, even if I would never forget. Harry's idea wasn't a stupid one, and I understood what he wanted from it. Maybe it really wouldn't hurt for me to give it some thought.

The game was amazing. I didn't get on to the field, but Gerry did and true to her word, she had a few moves that Oliver, excellent keeper though he is, wasn't able to defend. I shouted myself hoarse when we eventually won a very close game and my team mates made their way back to the changing rooms. I was even more excited when Gwenog turned to me and said 'next week it's your turn, Weasley. You'll need to be on top of your game because we're playing the Tornados on their turf.'

It was the perfect ending to the perfect day, and the only thing that marred it was that Harry was away on one of his, increasingly frequent, missions with Kingsley and the Aurors. He had been reluctant to talk about this one, saying he would let me know what it was when he got back, so I was eager to talk to him and share my experiences and find out about this mysterious trip he'd had to take.


	14. Mission Meltdown

_A/N: I'm sorry this has taken so long. My NaNoWriMo and my Ginny Big Bang stories took a lot more work than I expected. But I am now back and updates should be once a week again from next week. Sorry to land you all with angst-arama in this first new update, but I just happened to be at that part of my plan. Things won't be this angsty forever, promise._

Chapter 13: Mission Meltdown

I was still floating on air after the team celebration, so I headed back to Harry's place that evening. I went there even though he wouldn't be around because it was the one place I could feel close to him when he was away on his missions. I had gotten better at closing out my fears while he was gone, but it still felt safer and better somehow to be in his home while he was out there. Today, Ron and Hermione were there, too, and both were really excited about our win. I'm really pleased that we hadn't been playing the Cannons. I suspect Ron would have been less excited if we'd beaten 'his boys.' As it was, we had a few firewhiskeys and talked long into the night. I felt a few twinges of envy as I watched Ron and Hermione together because they were so close and loving, and I desperately wanted Harry to be there too. I missed him; he'd been away for several days now and I wanted to hug him the way Hermione was able to hug Ron.

I got my things together, ready to head home about two in the morning. I had flooed Mum and Dad that I was staying to hang out with Ron and Hermione, but I knew Mum would still freak out if I didn't come home by the time they woke up. Just as I headed to the door there was a tired pop from the hallway and Harry appeared, looking more haggard than I have ever seen him before. Even the day he allowed Voldemort to kill him he looked better than this because that day he burned with the knowledge that he'd won and done the right thing. Today, he looked sick and defeated.

'Harry! What's the matter?' I said as I threw my arms around him. He wearily put his around me as well, and buried his face in my hair.

'I'm so glad you're here,' he said in a broken voice. 'Can you stay a bit?'

I pulled back and looked at him. It was clear something was eating at him and that he wanted to unburden himself. Since this was not his usual way, I knew whatever was going on must be big. That fear that had swirled inside me for so long rose up again since I could tell that this mission had clearly not gone to plan, but I nodded, smoothing his hair back off his face. 'I will, but only if you let me put you to bed right now. You look like you need about a million years of sleep before talking about this.'

By this time Ron and Hermione were in the hallway with us. Hermione went into instant mother mode. 'Harry, you need to sit down. What happened? I'll get you a cup of tea.'

Harry shook her off. 'I don't want tea. I just want to lie down.' Hermione tried to argue, and he added, 'I'll be fine. Honest. I just want to sleep.'

He looked at me beseechingly, and I laced my fingers through his and began to move him in the direction of the bedroom. Over my shoulder, I said to Ron, 'could you send an owl to Mum, Ron? Just let her know Harry's not well and I'm staying here to look after him.'

'Not bloody likely. She'll skin me alive for being the one to tell her you're staying the night with him.'

'Don't be a prat, Ron. This is important,' I growled.

'I'll do it,' said Hermione. 'She can't kill me – I'm not family yet.'

I closed the door on Ron's comeback to that little gem, and focused on Harry.

'You go take a shower. You look like you need one, and I'll get things sorted out in here.'

By the time he came out of the shower, he looked a little less haunted and I crossed to him and wrapped my arms around him. Once again, he hid his face and clung on to me, his breath ragged. I pulled him down to the bed and made him lie down. He still clutched at me and I knew he was trying to get himself under control. One thing I knew with Harry was not to push him to talk until he's ready, and it's a fine line for him between clamming up forever and needing a gentle hint to start talking. When his breathing began to settle down and he loosened his death grip on me, I took the chance.

'Do you want to talk about it?' I rubbed my hand back and forth across his back, trying to sooth some of his tension out of him.

His voice was so low I could hardly hear it, and he kept his face averted from mine so I couldn't see him when he said it. 'I killed someone today.' My hand stilled for a hint of a second, then carried on its work. I ached for him. His voice held immense pain as he said it.

'I'm sorry.' It seemed like the most inadequate thing to say, but none of the other things that swarmed into my head were any use either. I kissed the part of his face I could reach and tasted wet salt. My arms went around him completely and I held him as he shook.

Eventually he stopped shaking, but he still wouldn't look at me. At least he began to talk, sometimes in incoherent murmurs, into my hair. Finally, he got hold of himself enough to get a coherent story out.

'Do you remember I said I'd tell you about this one when I got back?' I nodded, which ne must have felt because he carried on. 'It was a delicate situation, involving Malfoy and some of the other left over Death Eaters.'

'Malfoy's still a Death eater?' I gasped, trying to reconcile that with what I'd seen over a year ago at the battle.

'No, that was the problem. We heard that some of the remaining Death Eaters were putting pressure on him. It seemed like a situation where we could get in and get out so Kingsley took me and a couple of other trainees along for the practice.' He shuddered as he said it, but he finally let go enough for me to look at him properly. He actually looked better than before. He'd needed to get some of that emotion out.

'So, what happened? How did it go wrong?' He pulled his eyes away from mine again, but at least didn't try to stop me seeing his face.

'I don't know. It started the way we had expected. We visited Malfoy, he sneered a little but was otherwise okay. Kingsley convinced him to give us the names of the Death Eaters who had been released already who had taken up the cause again.'

'Death Eaters have been released?' The information sent terror into my heart again.

That finally earned me a smile, albeit bitter. 'Yes, where have you been? The lowest level ones, the ones who were just doing grunt work and we couldn't prove did any of the killing, got out of Azkaban after a year.'

'Well, it wasn't in the sports pages, so I guess I ... uh ... missed it.' I tried to joke, but it sounded wrong even to me and Harry didn't even seem to notice what I'd said.

His twisted smile faded as he looked at me with sad eyes. 'We were packing up, just getting a few last details out of Malfoy, when they turned up.'

I had no idea what to say, so I just held him and listened as he carried on with the story.

'They attacked as soon as they saw us; they must have known why we were there. And then it was all so fast and I cast a spell ...' His voice broke again as he remembered it.

'I'm sure you did the right thing, Harry.'

He growled and climbed off the bed, beginning to pace across the room.

'You don't understand,' he ground out. 'I cast a spell and it went wrong. It was supposed to bind the guy up as he tried to attack Malfoy, but it hit him in the heart and he just ... fell.' He stopped in the middle of the room, his head down. 'I killed him because I cast a spell wrong.' He sounded angry, which was better than the broken way he'd first started to talk about it, even if not ideal.

'Harry, look at me. Was there anything you would do differently if you could go back in time without knowing the outcome?'

He looked at me and I could see the battle he was facing within himself.

'I'd practise that spell more before using it.' His voice sounded bitter and defeated as he began pacing again.

'But if you had no idea what was coming and the situation played out exactly as it did today, would you have chosen to do something different?' I persisted, trying to get him to see what I was getting at.

Harry stopped in his tracks, stilled completely. I could see his brain working furiously, then he finally said, 'I ... no, I don't think so. It was all too fast and I had to decide in a split second as the guy aimed at Malfoy.'

I got off the bed, too, and walked over to him. He wouldn't look at me, so I pulled his face around so I could look him in the eye. 'I'm sorry this happened Harry, and it's a terrible thing for you, but you can't second guess yourself. You did what you had to do.'

He shook his head, and I kissed him. 'I don't mean you won't feel it. You _should_ feel it, always, but don't let it define you. This isn't who you are any more than 'The Boy Who Lived' or any of those other titles the papers have put on you all this time.'

'I guess so,' he said. The new shadow was still in his eye. 'I thought it would be different, you know. I knew there would be danger to us and we needed to know how to defend, but I never,' he stopped as he tried to think of the right word. 'I never thought it would be me who was the danger to someone else. I feel like ... like I'm just the same as them.'

I hugged him again, pouring all the support I could into the contact. 'Oh, Harry. You're not. If you can't believe anything else, believe that if a Death Eater had done this today, he wouldn't be agonising over it the way you are. That makes you very different to them.'

I could tell he wasn't convinced, but he wrapped his arms around me, and he seemed at least a little happier than he had been when he arrived back at the flat.

'Come on. It's late and you need to sleep, Harry.' I pulled him back to the bed and this time got him under the covers. He lay there, still tense, and I held him until he fell asleep. I remembered how I felt after my time with Tom Riddle's diary, and the fear that I could kill someone and that those dark places he found in me were who I really was ate at me. I fell asleep myself, trying to remember how I had dragged myself back together and made myself go on and wondering if anything in my experience could help Harry through this.

Next morning, Harry was out of bed by the time I woke up. He stood at his window, and I could tell he was dwelling on what happened yesterday. I got out of bed and padded over to him, giving him a hug from behind as I said, 'Morning.' His hand squeezed mine and he turned to look at me. The haunted look in his eyes was gone, but there was a deep sadness and pain that I knew would take time to heal.

'How are you today?' I asked.

'Better.' He smiled, but it still had that twisted quality to it. 'But can you do me one favour, Ginny?'

'Of course.'

'I don't want to talk about this, to anyone else. Please don't let Ron and the others know what happened.' He looked so terrible as he said it, that I hugged him tighter. 'I don't want the _Daily Prophet_ to get their hands on this.'

The thought hadn't even occurred to me, even though we'd been hounded by the press so much over the last year. Harry, however, looked like someone who had thought of all the possible nasty angles this thing could generate. I didn't want to make him more upset than he already was, but I had to ask.

'Won't they already know? I mean ... there were other people there, right?'

Harry sighed heavily. 'Yes, but they aren't sure what they saw, and Kingsley has fudged it a bit as to what happened.' I looked at him in confusion. How could he know what Kingsley had done? Harry gave me another sad smile. 'He sent me an owl this morning.' For the first time I noticed the unrolled parchment on the windowsill in front of Harry. 'Kingsley has made a press release basically saying that there was a disturbance at Malfoy's place and in the confusion, one man with a dodgy heart had a heart attack.' His mouth twisted. 'I guess that's one way to put it.'

'Is that true? About the weak heart I mean?'

Harry sighed. 'Yeah, apparently. Any spell that hit him right there would have done it. It still leaves out the critical piece of information, though. And that leaves a sour taste in my mouth. But Kingsley said it was better this way.'

There was nothing to say. I kept my arms wrapped around him as he stood there lost in his own thoughts. Harry had to learn to live with himself and the chips from this would fall as they would. All I could do was to be there for him, and make sure he didn't destroy himself with his guilt.

When I went out into the flat's lounge, Hermione was sitting on the couch flipping through a _Magical Enforcement_ magazine.

'How's Harry? He looked dreadful last night.' She tried to keep idly flipping through the magazine, but it was obvious that the answer was important to her.

'He's okay. It was a difficult mission, is all. He was just wrung out by it all.'

'Yeah, the _Prophet_ said something happened at Malfoy's place, but the details weren't very clear.' She indicated the newspaper lying in front of her on the coffee table. I was relieved to see that it hadn't made the front page. Whatever fallout Harry was going to have to face, it hadn't landed yet. He had time to get himself worked out before he had to face the press.

I sat down next to Hermione, and said, 'that's because the details aren't very clear to anyone. All I know is it was a mess, and that Harry really doesn't want to talk about it. He doesn't want to be badgered about it.' I sighed as I thought about him. He had refused to come out of his room, and I had left him to it.

'I wouldn't badger him about it.' Hermione's voice was offended.

I cocked my eyebrow at her and she blushed. 'Okay, I like to know things, but it's really not my place anymore ...'

'As if it ever was,' I teased her affectionately. When she tried to poke me in the side I pushed her off, then added, 'I know what you mean. But there are some things that just need to be left alone. I think this is one of them, but he'll talk eventually, I'm sure.'

She nodded and went back to reading her magazine. I slid off the couch and went into the kitchen to get us some food. That was the good thing about Hermione, I thought as I headed back to Harry's room. She may be a dreadful nag, and she may think she always knows best, but she will listen if you make a good argument. I knew she wouldn't bother Harry and that she would keep Ron from prying too. I was pretty sure he would tell them eventually; he always did, but at least now he had the time to come to it on his own terms.


	15. Recovery

Chapter 14: Recovery.

The next few days were hard for Harry and it broke my heart to see him that way. He was on tenterhooks all the time waiting for the press to get their hands on the real story, twitching every time someone knocked on the door and almost snatching the papers from the delivery owls whenever they appeared. But it seemed to blow over without incident. Auror work was often dangerous and from the sounds of it, this sort of thing had happened before. Not the part where an Auror killed someone with a single spell, but someone with a weak heart dying in the course of a mission, so it just didn't make too many huge waves. The _Daily Prophet_ did run another piece on the second day, and Harry's hands went white with strain as he saw the delivery owl arrive with the paper. I read the article aloud to him.

_Tragedy on Auror training mission._

_Tragedy at work has affected the newest batch of Auror trainees who are almost due out on our streets to protect us from the lingering effects of the recent reign of terror by the organisation known as Death Eaters. Among them is Harry Potter, the 'Boy Who Lived' who was instrumental in bringing down the leader of the Death Eaters._

'You, know, you'd think they could actually make themselves say 'Voldemort' now, wouldn't you?' I said as Harry paced restlessly around the floor, staring at me.

'You'd think,' he said in agreement, but I could tell he wasn't keen on discussing the idiocy of the reporters, so I smiled at him and kept reading.

_While tracking down some dark wizards, a routine interview turned bad as one of the suspects suffered a heart attack. None of those present, including Minister for Magic Kingsley Shaklebolt who was overseeing this final mission prior to graduation for the young recruits ..._

I looked up at Harry, who was still restlessly moving from one side of the room to the other. 'You didn't tell me this was your final mission before you graduated.'

'I didn't know until afterwards. Kingsley didn't want us to do anything different to normal.' His mouth twisted in a sour smile. 'Guess I surprised him.'

I gave him a sympathetic smile and continued reading.

_... this final mission before graduating for the young recruits, was able to bring the man around. This is an unfortunate incident to occur during this test, but it shouldn't marr the futures of any of the new Aurors. We wish them all the best for their careers, and will watch what the future holds for Mr. Potter with particular interest._

'That's it?' Harry sounded surprised.

'That's it,' I confirmed. 'Looks like you don't need to worry, Harry.' I turned to see him looking less than thrilled. 'What's the matter?' I asked as his face became stone.

'I _should_ have to worry. I killed someone – that shouldn't be able to be brushed aside and explained away. There should be disciplinary action, a trial ...' He paced around the room again, running his hands through his hair in agitation. It stuck up in unruly tufts as he turned anguished eyes on me, then looked away, his eyes skipping from one object to another, clearly not taking in anything he was looking at

'Harry, look at me. This is ridiculous.' He glared at me, taking deep breaths to try and calm himself down. 'You didn't cast a spell to kill, right. I'm sure Kingsley has talked to you about this, at length and who knows – if you really want disciplinary action maybe he'll oblige if you ask him nicely.'

Harry's smile twisted into life again at that, but disappeared soon after. I slid off the bed I was sitting on and went over to him. 'You didn't mean to do this, and you can't keep living it again and again as you beat yourself up. And you know what? I think you're doing a great job of a trial and punishment on yourself. You don't need someone outside to do it.' I wrapped my arms around him and pulled him into my shoulder. His arms came around me and he held me for a long time.

When he stepped back he had pushed the incident away from him again, but the memory still lingered in his eyes and I knew he was still waiting for the lid to come off this. He still expected someone to expose him as a killer.

While I wanted to be there for Harry during this time, he was forced back into the Ministry and my training was intensifying in the lead up to the second game of the season. Kingsley promised me he'd talk to Harry so I tried not to worry about him too much. The training was so physical and intense that Gerry and I took to going out to a bar afterwards just to unwind. We never drank alcohol (that was one of Gwenog's big no-noes during training) but we needed the time to get ourselves back in order and able to go home. I needed to get my head out of the game and back into a place where I could be there for Harry. To do that I needed to unwind.

One evening, a few days after Harry's unfortunate mission, we finished up a little earlier than usual and got to our familiar bar before seven. While Gerry went to get us some butterbeer, I slid into the closest booth, exhausted, and leaned my head back against the worn fabric, closing my eyes.

'Ginny! How are you doing?' The voice was familiar and I squinted my eyes open and looked up.

'Oliver! We seem to be running into each other an awful lot lately.' I stood up to give him a hug before sitting down again behind the battered table.

'Coincidence,' he smiled at me as he slid into the booth on the other side of the table.

'Uh-huh.' I looked over to where Gerry was laughing with the guy behind the bar and said, 'she has a boyfriend you know.'

'I know,' he said, casting a look at her too. 'And I'm honestly just being friendly here, Ginny. We never really got a chance to catch up last week.' Olover's eyes were wide and innocent – too innocent. I wasn't buying it.

'You checked up on her after the game. Aw, that's so sweet, Oliver.' I teased him.

'I didn't mean that. I was just saying I'd met you guys, and someone mentioned ...' He started to squirm as he tried to justify his knowledge.

I laughed, for what seemed the first time in days. 'Man, Oliver. You squirm really well. I'll have to remember that in future.'

'Jeepers, Ginny. You're far too quick with that tongue.'

'I like to think so,' I said, winking at him.

Gerry came over with our butterbeers and slid in beside Oliver before he could make a come back. I could see her eyeing him up, and the two of them fell back into the easy banter they had shared before the game last week. I could see the electricity crackling between them and when Oliver headed to the bar a few minutes later I turned to Gerry in concern.

'What in Merlin's bloody name are you doing?'

'What? I'm having a little fun with a nice guy, what's the big deal?' Her voice was edgy and defensive.

'The big deal, Gerry, is that he likes you and you have a boyfriend. It's really not nice to treat him this way.'

Gerry's smile was forced and she looked embarrassed. 'Actually I don't have a boyfriend anymore. We broke up two weeks ago.' Her fingers played with a knot in the wood on the table as she avoided my eye.

'Gerry! Why didn't you tell me?'

'Well, at first I was embarrassed and the game was coming up, and then you had that stuff with Harry and I didn't want to intrude.' She finally looked at me, and she looked somehow smaller. I reached out and clutched her hand, giving it a squeeze as I gave her a sympathetic smile.

'Oh, Gerry. You really should have said; I would have come and been with you.'

'I know. That's why I didn't tell you. It was obvious even to a dunce like me that Harry needed you right then.' Her cheeky smile was back. 'Anyway, I dumped him, so I'm not that upset.'

'You are not a dunce! And how do you know about the Harry thing?' I was worried that some sort of whisper had come out that people were repeating.

'Well, I don't know what exactly is up, but you went from always being miss good-for-my-mum's-sake to staying every bloody night at his place and looking like death warmed up when his name was mentioned. It was pretty obvious something was up.'

Damn, she was right. I had told Mum the bare bones of what was going on with Harry and she had mellowed enough to agree that me staying with him was a good idea. I had no intention now of losing that privilege either.

'Merlin's sake, Gerry. You are far too observant for your own good. Harry is – working through some stuff, but I can still be a good friend to you as well.'

'It's not so bad. I get to flirt with cute quidditch players as much as I want to now.' The grin Gerry directed over her shoulder was pure flirtation.

'Well, whatever you do, don't hurt him, okay. Make sure you're not doing some stupid rebound thing.'

'I'm being careful , Ginny, don't worry.'

Oliver reappeared with the next round of drinks and talk drifted to less dangerous subjects. By the time we left two hours later, I had managed to unwind and get my head out of training space and into a 'being with Harry' space and Gerry and Oliver had made some inroads into a promising flirtation.

I apparated just inside the door of Harry and Ron's apartment around eleven and tiptoed into Harry's room. He was lying in bed awake as I knew he would be. He never slept until I got there on the days I had training.

'How are you?' I asked as I climbed onto the bed and wrapped my arms around him, breathing in the scent of citrus that lingered on his breath.

'I'm okay,' he said, and smiled at me. For the first time since the mission the smile was natural and untainted by his pain. I squeezed him tight.

'I've been thinking, Harry.' I said.

'Hmmmm?' he asked, looking down at me.

'I don't think getting married on the anniversary of the battle is that stupid an idea.'

Harry sat up, a look of hope in his eyes. 'You changed your mind?'

'I ran into Oliver a while back.' I carefully avoided reminding him what day it was that I had seen Oliver first. 'And he mentioned the memorial and the battle and I, I dunno, I realised that I didn't want to run away or curl into a ball and forget about it. I was ... almost happy to remember sharing it with him.' I snuggled into his chest and he settled back against the pillows again.

'Really? You really think you could do that?' The aching hope in his voice made me shiver. I looked up at him, but couldn't see his eyes because this side of his face was in shadow.

'I really think I could. I mean, I'll always miss Fred with a raw ache, but I don't think getting married on the day of the battle's anniversary will be like forgetting him.'

'It's remembering him – making him part of it.'

I smiled up at Harry and said, 'yes. I understand what you meant now. If he can't be there in person at least he can be there in spirit, right?'

'Right.' He smiled again, that same natural smile he'd used earlier. I looked him over carefully, seeing a new relaxation in his body and a softer, less hard look on his face.

'Harry? Did something happen today while I was out? You seem more at peace than before.'

'I talked to Kingsley about how I've been feeling, and he told me about the first time he ever, you know ...' he waved his hand, pretending to cast a spell and I nodded. He didn't need to spell it out again for me. 'I don't know. I guess it helped to know that everyone feels the way I do.'

'I'm so glad, Harry. This really wasn't your fault, and it hurt so bad to see you beating yourself up about it so much.'

'Oh, I think there's plenty of self-beating to come,' he said, giving me a slightly twisted smile. 'I just feel like I'm not alone in having done this now.'

I gave him a quick kiss and said, 'besides, you knew I hex you into next week if you didn't stop moping soon.'

Harry laughed and agreed. Then the look in his eyes changed and he said, 'I think we should tell your family, now we have a date for the wedding. What do you think?'

'I think if we didn't and Mum got wind of how long we've been planning this, she'd hex _both_ of us into next week.' I twisted up to kiss him again. 'I think – maybe after the match this weekend?'

'That sounds good. I just hope your mum takes it well.'

'Oh, I think she'll take it exactly as expected – lots of tears and big plans.'

Harry looked slightly panicked at the idea and I grinned at him. 'Don't worry. I'm a Weasley; I know exactly how to handle Mum. I'll scare her with the idea of an elopement if she tries to make too many of the decisions.'

Harry's eyes twinkled at me as he said, 'I can't wait to see the sparks fly.'


	16. More Game Plans

Chapter fifteen: More Game Plans

My worry over Harry had made me lose focus on my upcoming first game. Not that I practised any less or wasn't fully in the moment while with the team, but I hadn't had time outside of training to really think about the fact that I was going to be on the national stage in a few short days. This game was an away game at Pride of Portree headquarters on the Isle of Skye, so at least I wouldn't be under the glare of local fans if I stuffed up. Of course, the flip side of that was that I would be under the ecstatic gaze of the opposition fans if that happened. I woke up on Saturday morning feeling ridiculously nervous which made me really angry at myself. I had helped defeat the darkest wizard of all time, finished my schooling under the spotlight of the national press and spent the last week dealing with a depressed fiancé, and yet I was letting a little game stress me out.

My words to myself didn't help at all, so I got out of bed, trying not to wake Harry, and began to do the one thing that keeps my mind of things when I'm really nervous. I cleaned. Harry's room didn't need much help, so I found myself in the kitchen, scrubbing down the surfaces and making sure all the dishes were clean. I giggled as I remembered my younger self helping Mum with the cleaning at home and dreaming one day of being married to the wonderful Harry Potter. My nerves then were over actually meeting him, and this time they were about my first step into my career, but the result was the same: a sparkly clean kitchen.

I stepped back to admire my handiwork, and came crashing up against someone standing behind me. I gasped, shocked, as arms came around me and I felt warm breath whisper past my ear. A waft of Harry's unique scent drifted past me and I smiled, relaxing into his arms.

'Why are you so nervous,' Harry said in a voice still thick with sleep.

'I'm not nervous, I just needed to do some cleaning, that's all. Your kitchen was filthy.'

'It wasn't that bad.' He looked away, grinning as I looked at him sideways. 'You always clean when you're really nervous. Your mum told me,' he added as I must have looked surprised.

'I do not – well, not anymore. I grew out of it, and I clean all the time you know,' I said pushing on a wisp of hair that was tickling my face. I could feel the wrinkles in my hands from the wash water and sighed. 'Okay, you're right. When I clean normally I don't usually do it without magic.'

Harry laughed and my heart lifted again, just because it was such an unusual sound from him these days.

'You'll come to the game, right?' I said, turning to slide my arms around his neck.

'I wouldn't miss it,' he smiled at me. 'Besides, I need to be there to make that trip to the Burrow afterwards.' His smile still held a tiny shadow underneath it, but he seemed much more relaxed today than he had since that mission.

I reached up and kissed him. 'That's right, you do. No way I'm facing those ravening monsters alone!'

'Come on, forget the cleaning and come back to bed.' He tugged on my hand as he moved away, heading towards his room.

'I can't, Gwenog is really strict about that sort of thing.' I didn't put up much resistance. The idea of snuggling with Harry was much more soothing on my nerves than even the cleaning I had done.

'Gwenog will never know.' Harry stopped moving and kissed my neck, sending shivers down my spine, then added, 'anyway, I was only offering a massage.'

'Uh-huh, sure. Why don't I believe that?' I giggled as he tickled me, already much calmer than I had been when I woke up that morning.

I did manage to get back to sleep, and found myself at Harpies Headquarters clutching my bag of gear with sweaty hands barely an hour after I woke up again. While I could still feel the jitters marching around my stomach, I felt a little more refreshed and had thankfully lost the urge to clean everything in sight.

'You alright, Ginny? You look a bit pale.' Gerry waved a hand in front of my face and I jerked back, then smiled at her.

'I'm fine. This is my usual not-getting-enough-sun effect.'

She gave a disbelieving snort, but stopped bugging me about it when Gwenog stood up at the front of our meeting room and said, 'OK, ladies, this is it. Our first away game for the season, so make it one to remember. Look sharp as these Portree players can be vicious. Meredith, you'll be playing seeker today as Marcela is injured, Ginny and Gerry you two will be starting chasers with Lizzy and Aurora rested for today, and Rosa you will be one of the Beaters, replacing Jessica. Everyone else will be as last week.' She looked around catching everyone's eyes and making sure we all knew what we were doing. 'Everyone clear? Right, time to apparate then. When you get to Portree headquarters make sure you have everything then meet us in the visitor's changing room.'

Strangely enough, the familiar gruff tones had eased my nerves considerably and by the time we got to Portree I was boiling with excitement, the jitters in my stomach practically gone. Walking out onto the pitch for the first time was an amazing experience. Among the sea of deep purple robes in the stand, there were large pockets of spectators wearing the Harpie's green. It was a heady feeling hearing people cheer as I walked onto the pitch, people who weren't just my schoolmates. I felt a real sense of responsibility to do my best to win this game. These were our biggest fans and they deserved our best in return.

Once I kicked off from the ground, however, the crowd seemed to disappear. All that mattered was getting the quaffle and putting past the keeper into the hoops. The opposing chasers and beaters were mere irritants as I focused on the ball. Having said that, this game was a far cry even from the brutal training sessions Gwenog had used to try and break us. There was no holding back by either team, so by the time the final whistle blew I was covered in bruises both from bludgers and from having slammed into other chasers getting to the ball. Even though Portree's chasers and beaters were a brilliant team I managed to get the ball past the keeper once to score a goal, but in the end it didn't matter. We lost the game 170 points to 40 as their seeker got the snitch just as Meredith reached for it.

It was disappointing, but the sheer thrill of having played in a professional game had me buzzing after the game anyway. Gerry teased me the whole time we were getting changed because I couldn't stay in one place. I bounced into the change rooms filled with nervous energy, and could hardly stay even in the showers getting cleaned up.

'Surely with those bruises you should be groaning in a corner somewhere?' Gerry's voice was filled with amusement. I remembered she hadn't been this bad last week; she had merely babbled a little about how exciting it had been. Gwenog observed us both with amusement as I answered her.

'Nope. I can't even feel them. Come on, let's go. I want to see Harry.' I tugged on Gerry's arm trying to get her to move faster.

'You'll need to spell those bruises off, Ginny, or you will be feeling them in the morning. Get that Auror man of yours to help you with that,' Gwenog interjected. She winked at me as she headed into the shower herself.

'Aren'tyou coming to the after-party in the clubrooms?' Gerry asked as I finally stopped tugging at her long enough for her to get her clothes on.

'Nope, we have a standing date with my parents. They want to hear all about my first game.' Unable to keep still any longer waiting for her, I gave her a quick hug and rushed out to find Harry.

He was waiting just outside the door and I threw myself at him, just about knocking him off balance as he hugged me back. I kissed him enthusiastically which he didn't seem to mind.

'That was the best feeling ever, Harry!' I finally managed to gasp out. 'I don't even care that we lost, I feel so alive.'

Harry laughed. 'You wouldn't say that if you were playing the Cannons,' he said with a cheeky grin that didn't quite mask the worry in his eyes. I remembered he'd told me how much he worried when I played, and since my own irrational fears about him on his missions were only tamped down rather than gone, I decided to pretend I didn't notice and tease him as usual.

'Well, the Cannons are a special case. I couldn't possibly let Ron have that sort of ammunition to tease me with.'

Harry gave me one last, big hug before releasing me and I winced as he crushed some of my bruises.

'Are you hurt, Ginny?' He was immediately concerned.

'No, not really. I just need someone to do that bruise- removing spell and then we can go tell Mum and Dad we're getting married.'

Harry smiled at me, and as I reached up to kiss him, a voice shrieked, 'you're getting married? Oh, why didn't you tell me?' and I was surrounded in bushy brown hair rather than getting my kiss.

'We were just about to tell everyone, Hermione. In fact we're on our way to the Burrow to do it right now.' I winced while talked as Hermione carefully cast the spell and the bruises stung a little as they disappeared.

When Hermione had finished with me, she linked her arm through Harry's, I took his hand, and we began to walk to the apparition point while we talked.

'I'm so glad. After ... well, after the way things have been this week, we sure need cheering up.'

Harry's eyes narrowed as he looked at me and I squeezed his hand as if to say I hadn't told Hermione. She noticed his look and interpreted it correctly.

'I have no idea what's really bugging you, Harry, but even you have to admit you haven't been a bundle of laughs lately. He grimaced, and I saw the shadow cross back into his eyes as he remembered the last week. Trying to pull him away from toppling into moroseness again, I poked him in the side with my free hand, making him look at me.

'Oi, you. No moping allowed. You know Mum will be all over you when we tell them. We need you on top of your game, or you know you'll be given a hundred wedding jobs to do before we leave tonight.'

His eyes lightened as he smiled at me and nodded. I caught Hermione's eye behind his back and she mouthed 'I want to talk to you later.' I nodded, figuring I owed it to her to tell her something of what had been going on, especially since she and Ron had copped most of Harry's attitude while I was at training.

Ron was waiting for us as we got to the Burrow. He was livid because he hadn't managed to get to the game because George had an emergency order that had to be filled and they'd both worked past the start time. Since one of Ron's favourite players was the star player of Portree, their Seeker, Klaus Blomfeld he hated that he'd missed the chance to meet him. Still holding Harry's hand, I watched as Hermione tried to describe the game for Ron. His eyes must have rotated in their sockets, they were rolled so often, but he never expressed his frustration with her which showed remarkable restraint, I felt. Possibly, Mum had been at him about not ruining the gathering with a fight, or possibly he was just growing up and learning that some things just aren't worth fighting over. Either way, I smiled at him and gave him a hug.

'You did great, Ginny. You scored a goal!' He was almost as excited as I had been, and I grinned at him.

'I know! It was the most amazing feeling being out there, playing a real league game of quidditch.' I bounced a little as I said it, and Harry laughed beside me.

'I think you need a grounding charm to keep you here with us.'

'Prat,' I poked at him again, but this time he got out of the way, still laughing.

'Pity you didn't win,' said Ron, and I poked my tongue out at him the way we had as small kids.

'Well, I didn't expect to win. Portree are top of the table after last game. And at least we held them to a 130 point differential, unlike the Cannons' stunning 340-point loss last week.'

Fortunately, Mum arrived in the entranceway at that point and stopped Ron from retorting, or at least me from having to hear what he said, as she hugged me. 'We're so proud of you, Ginny. Are you hungry? I made all your favourite things to eat. Come into the kitchen and sit down.'

I smiled at Harry, who looked a bit nervous as we moved into the other room. 'Don't worry,' I whispered. 'I won't make you make a big announcement. You'll see.'

True to form, the table was groaning under the weight of all the food Mum had cooked. I'm fairly certain that if it wasn't held up by magic the whole thing was in danger of toppling over. The other boys were all already seated around the table with Dad and Fleur, so the rest of us found places to sit and everyone settled in.

Conversation focused on the game, Dad and Hermione's new issues at the Ministry and George's shop. Dad was having problems with one of his staff members never turning up for work on time, and Hermione was irritated by one of her workmates' sloppy record keeping. They sympathised with each other while Mum fussed, as she always did, about George living alone in the room over the shop. I was pleased to see George moving even further out of his depression as he joked with Mum that he wasn't usually alone. His saucy wink made me giggle, and Mum picked up on it immediately.

'See, you're setting a bad example for your sister. She's all but moved in with Harry.' Harry blushed and began to shovel food as fast as he could while avoiding anyone's eyes. I rolled my eyes at her.

'Oh, Mum, I have not. That room with all my stuff in upstairs? That's where I live.' I grinned at her as I leaned over to select some more potatoes from the bowl steaming in the centre of the table.

Mum mumbled something like, 'could've fooled me' and I added, 'besides, it won't be long before Harry and I get married and you can stop worrying.' I took a bite of food, pretending to be unaware that I had said anything abnormal. Harry choked on his chicken beside me and grabbed for a glass of water as his face turned even brighter red.

The conversation stilled as everyone took in what I'd said.

'You are getting married?' Fleur asked after several long seconds. 'You 'ave set a date?'

'Actually, yes we have.' I smiled at Harry who had finally got himself under control. 'Don't worry, Mum, you have plenty of time to plan.' I turned to Mum, and saw she was frozen in place, as if she couldn't believe it. My speaking to her directly seemed to snap her out of it, however, and she leapt up and raced around the table to pull Harry and then me into big hugs.

'Oh this is wonderful. Isn't this wonderful, Arthur?' I looked over at Dad who was wiping his eyes. He smiled at me and I tried to say something to him but it got smothered in Mum's enthusiastic hugging and the start to her planning. I gave Harry a wry grin as we listened to her talk.

'You can have it in the garden, Like Bill and Fleur. Don't you think it would be lovely to start a tradition of having them all in our garden? And depending on the date, you can have some of those lovely orange Lotus Snap blossoms ...' She carried on like this for several minutes. I noticed Harry open his mouth once or twice to disagree with her and I pressed my foot onto his, shaking my head.

Several hours later, after we'd got away from Mum for a while, had a chance to talk to everyone and had more mead and firewhiskey than was good for us, we were snuggled in at Harry's flat.

'That went well, I thought,' I said, with my head pillowed on his chest.

'I think so, too,' said Harry, dropping a light kiss onto my hair. 'I just wish you hadn't sprung it on me out of the blue. I thought I'd have a chance to prepare myself a bit more.'

I chuckled and felt an answering rumble through his chest. 'And miss that golden opportunity? I don't think so.'

He smiled at me. 'Your mother is going to be insane with this, isn't she?'

'Oh yes. You should have seen her with Bill, and he's not her only daughter. She will go to town on this. But don't worry, I have a plan for managing her excesses.' I traced a pattern on his pyjama shirt with my free hand.

'What? Give in to keep the peace?' I could hear the amusement in his voice and again it made my heart lighten. I knew he wasn't yet past his guilt over that mission, but he had begun to heal and it made me happy every time he laughed.

I snorted. 'I don't think so, Potter. No, you'll see. We'll get the wedding we want, not the one Mum wants.'

I had a plan, after all, and all it was going to take was a little help from Hermione.


	17. Ferreting For the Truth

Chapter 16: Ferreting for the Truth

Hermione grabbed me the next morning and refused to let me out of the house before I told her what had been going on. I cast an imploring look at Harry, but he just gave me a cheeky look, the prat, and took Ron off somewhere. I took that as permission to tell Hermione at least the bare bones of his story before we got onto the wedding stuff.

'So, what's going on with you two?' Hermione started, blunt as ever. 'I thought at first it would be fixed when you guys started talking wedding plans, but Harry seems as bad as ever.' She gave the door he had disappeared through a considering look, and I had a sudden image of Ron with instructions to get the information out of Harry. Stifling a snigger at how badly that might end up, I answered Hermione.

'I really don't think it's my place to say much, but let's just say that Harry holds himself responsible for what happened.'

Hermione rolled her eyes, and said, 'For that man's death? Doesn't he always?'

'Yes,' I said, 'but this time he has reason to feel that way.' I ducked my head so she couldn't read the real tension on my face, but she caught on anyway. Bloody annoying insightful person that she is!

'Oh.' Her eyes went wide. 'Oh! You don't mean he ...'

'I think if you want to know anymore than that you'll have to talk to Harry.' She pulled a face, but she knew when to stop. I carried on, 'Anyway, the important thing is that Harry feels guilty about it and I don't want Mum riding over his wishes about this wedding thing while he's feeling this way. I think he would get really negative really fast.'

'Yeah, that would be bad. But what can you do? I mean, your mum was pretty excited last night so I don't see how you're going to be able to stop her from making plans.'

I giggled. 'I may have noticed one or two moments of excitement.' Hermione chuckled with me, and I added, 'No, I don't think we'll ever get her to give up planning. So what I want is for you to help me head her off at the pass whenever she gets going. Maybe ...' I thought for a few moments with my brow furrowed. 'Maybe you could suggest worse things than what I want, so when I suggest what Harry and I actually want to do it will look like a nice compromise?'

I could see Hermione struggling. Her face contorted in several weird shapes as she tried to keep it straight, but eventually she gave in and a huge laugh erupted. 'She'll go nuts!' she gasped.

'I know,' I laughed too. 'But you're the only one who can get away with it. She'd skin me and Ron if we tried, but she doesn't do that to you. Will you help?'

Her eyes still alight, Hermione said, 'of course!'

'There's another thing, too,' I said, suddenly serious. 'The date. It's going to freak the pants off Mum and George, but Harry was so set on it and with him in the state he's in right now, it was important to him.'

'That sounds ominous,' Hermione said, quieting immediately.

'It's not that bad. Just – the anniversary of the battle, the fourth anniversary.'

'I see what you mean,' Hermione said in a wry voice. 'It's an odd date.'

Feeling defensive I said, 'Yeah, well – Harry's idea, and he's right, is that we focus on it so much as a bad time. Why don't we add some good memories to it. Plus, that way it's kind of like ... like Fred is there with us.' My voice quivered and I mentally kicked myself. I was supposed to be getting over this. Talking about Fred's death wasn't meant to be hitting me hard this long after the battle. Hermione noticed and gave me a quick hug.

'You guys are right, and when it comes to it you have to do what you want to do, not what your mum wants. I love her, but she does try to take over.'

I laughed and nodded and we settled in to decide what we were going to say. I needed to discuss in more detail with Harry what we wanted, but I knew if Mum came up with anything that we hadn't decided on for ourselves that I could just 'think about' both options until we were ready to put in our ideas. I wasn't stupid enough to think that Mum would have no good ideas, either, and this way I could use her expertise while keeping away from her more excessively romantic thoughts. While my eleven year old self raised her head and sniffed hopefully at the idea of flowers and floating gowns, my eighteen year old self knew that's not what I wanted now and squashed Miss Dramatic once and for all.

It was several days before we had to put any of the plan into action so I had time to talk to Harry about it a little and let him know what Hermione and I were up to. Something of his old humour glimmered in his eyes as he thought about some of the things Hermione and I had come up with for her to suggest.

On a cool day in late autumn Mum cornered me in the back garden. We didn't have training that day so I was enjoying the crisp air in the orchard. The apples were ready and I had just accioed one to me when Mum appeared at my side.

'Ginny we need to talk about your wedding. I know you said it was a long way away, but these things take time to plan ...'

'Mum, I mean it. We're not getting married for years yet.'

'Years? Oh, no dear. You don't need to wait that long.'

'The date is set, and we've booked the celebrant wizard already. It's done.'

'Oh.' Mum paused for a few moments, then said in a tone that suggested she was trying to be casual, 'are you going to share what date it is?'

'Um ... May second, 2002.' I looked into the middle distance and took a bite of my apple, not wanting to see her face as she worked it out.

'Ginny!' Her voice was shaky and I could hear the effort it was costing her to hold herself together. 'Ginny, do you know what day that is?'

'Of course I do, Mum. Do you really think we didn't think through the implications of the decision?'

'I don't think I can do that, love ... it's the wrong day.'

I hugged her tight and said, 'I know. I felt like this too at first, but it's what Harry really wants. He wants ...' My voice broke too, and I pressed my face into her shaking shoulder. 'He wants Fred to be there with us, and you know he'd want us to be happy rather than sad.'

I heard a watery chuckle. 'Yes, you're right. He did like a good wedding, did Fred.'

I choked a little as I tried not to say anything, but my memory of Fred at Bill's wedding was of someone who didn't exactly feel overjoyed at all the fuss. It wasn't worth fighting over, though, since I knew there were bigger battles to come so I held my silence and Mum and I stayed hugging together for several minutes.

Later, Harry and I were at the Leaky Cauldron, enjoying a rare night where we could both be out at the same time.

'You know, this wedding thing isn't as bad as I thought it might be,' I said happily. 'Mum took the news of the date pretty well, considering. She didn't even tell me I was a selfish prat.' I smiled up at Harry. 'So she's one up on me there.'

He smiled back at me, and was about to say something when we were interrupted.

'Did I hear right? You're marrying the Weasel, Potter?' I knew that sneer anywhere. Looking up, I saw that I was right.

'Go away, Malfoy. Can't you see I'm enjoying time with my fiancé? I really don't need to see you right now.' Harry's voice was dismissive and I was impressed at how well he was reacting given that seeing Malfoy must have sent him right back to the day the mission went wrong.

'Look Potter, I know what happened the other week. What really happened I mean.'

Harry looked panicked and I clamped my hand down on his arm as he twitched for his wand. I could feel the tension in his arm but he shook his head at me slightly and I heard him whisper the muffliato spell before Malfoy could announce things to the whole pub. His eyes fixed on Malfoy's face, Harry said in a carefully controlled voice, 'Yeah? What are you going to do about it?'

Malfoy's ferret face twisted a little, he shuffled in his seat avoiding our eyes and I had a sudden feeling that he was uncomfortable here talking to us. He didn't seem to be any threat at all which piqued my curiosity.

'I want to thank you.' I glanced at Harry's face and saw his eyes widen a fraction as he took this in. 'I know that if you didn't hit that bloke ... well, I doubt I'd be here today.' Harry grimaced, clearly nervous that Malfoy had mentioned the spell he'd cast and troubled as always by any memory of what he'd done that day.

'It's my job, Malfoy. I'm paid to protect people.' Harry's voice was calm, almost pleasant but I could still feel the hard bands of his muscles under my fingers and I knew he was anxious.

'I know. I just wanted to say thanks. Don't worry; I don't want to be best friends with you or anything.' Malfoy sneered at the end of the sentence, but I could tell it was mostly bravura. It was obvious to me that he wanted to be anywhere but here now that he had said his piece, and after a couple more uncomfortable comments he stood up and left the table.

'Well, um ... good luck with the wedding and all, Potter. Weasley.' He walked away as fast as he could.

'Wow, seems like he grew up a bit,' I said, looking after him thoughtfully. 'Wonder what got into him.' I looked up at Harry to see him still focussed on the point where Malfoy had disappeared, looking worried. 'What's the matter, Harry? He's gone. It's fine; he just wanted to thank you.' Despite my words the tension hadn't left Harry's body and if anything he became more rigid.

'He knows, Ginny. How long until he forgets to be thankful and decides to turn me in. It would be quite the story wouldn't it? I can still remember seeing him with Rita bloody Skeeter at school. I don't trust him not to spill one day if it ever suited him.' Harry's eyes were narrow and his voice vicious as he kept his gaze on the door to the pub.

I stared at him, more than a little annoyed. I knew this had been hard for him, but here he was inventing issues for himself again. It was getting wearying. 'I think you're buying trouble. There's no reason to think he'd turn you in, and even if he did, don't you think Kingsley would help you through it? It's almost like you want to be caught.'

Harry gave a heavy sigh as he looked at me. 'It's not that I want to be caught; it's that I _expect_ to be caught – and Malfoy has the perfect opportunity, not to mention the personality.'

'Come on, let's go home.' I pulled harry to his feet and dragged him out of the Leaky Cauldron after me. 'I don't think there's any need to be worrying about this yet when there are far more pressing things to worry about.' I kept my voice light and teasing as I said it, trying to snap Harry out of his mood.

Harry gave me a grin that was almost believable. 'Like what?'

'Like my mum's plans for a full state wedding complete with all the wizarding ministers.'

'You're kidding,' he said, his eyes growing round at the thought.

I giggled. 'Yes, I am. But I'm sure her real plans aren't much less elaborate.'

'That was evil, Ginny. You know I don't want all that publicity.' He shivered, and I hugged myself to him, the memories of the press attention we'd had all last year fresh in my memory.

'I know. But I guess we'll have to expect it. After all, I am going to be a world famous quidditch star.' I smiled at him and he laughed.

'It's true' he said. 'I guess we need to think about where we'll do it at that. What do you think about Hogwarts?'

I hid a groan. Hogwarts? I knew it was Harry's closest thing to a real home, but there was no way I was going to get married on the anniversary of the battle at the place where it happened. I had learned my lesson, however, and said, 'don't you think that a wide open space like that would be the perfect place for that state wedding Mum wants? Not to mention that's term time. Do we really want all those students staring at us while we get married?'

Harry looked thoughtful. 'You're right,' he shuddered. 'It would be much better to have it somewhere smaller where we could limit the guest list. I don't want a whole bunch of people I don't know being there.'

'You know Harry, I don't think Mum's idea of the Burrow garden is such a stupid one. It's home, or like home, to both of us. It's small enough that we can safely keep people away if we don't want them ...'

He smiled at me. 'And it will make your mum happy. I think it's a great idea.'

We headed to the apparition point and went home. Ron and Hermione were at Harry's flat when we got there and we spent the rest of the evening talking with them. Ron and I teased each other about quidditch and Hermione mothered us all. It was nice to forget about both the wedding and Harry's guilts for a while; nice to be back to the way we used to be. We had plenty of time for all those things. Right then, we got to be young for a while and I revelled in it.


	18. Christmas

Chapter 17: Christmas

The next few weeks seemed to fly past. I ended up playing in nearly every game before the Christmas break, either starting or subbed on. We won almost all the games we played and quickly found ourselves second on the league tables, behind only Pride of Portree by the time the two week Christmas holiday started. Gerry and I worked so well together that it was soon routine for Gwenog to play us together. Hermione started calling us the 'G-force' after some Muggle science thing that I still don't understand, and the name stuck. First our team-mates took it up and then the media who liked the way it sounded. I was always wary of talking to the press after the experiences Harry and I had with Rita, but they never printed anything about our personal lives. I guess that ultimatum we made to Rita stuck fast. I tried to make myself feel guilty about it but I couldn't. She had made my life so miserable so often that the knowledge that I wasn't going to open a paper and find scandalous stories of my life was blissful. My professional life was another story, however, and I learnt really quickly to grow a thick skin when I made any mistakes on the field. Harry, on the other hand, would get into frothing rages about what was printed about my games which was quite endearing.

He also slowly became more like his old self. However, in between flashes of his old almost-cocky self-confidence were enough bouts of depression and guilt to make me want to smack him out of his moods. I never did, though, allowing him to talk it out when he needed to, understanding even through my frustration that he needed time to process his emotions. The meeting with Malfoy had done one good thing, it had forced Harry to confront things he had pushed aside and while it made his temper even more volatile than usual, the person who emerged at Christmas was happier and more at ease with himself than he had been since before the disastrous mission. The slightly haunted look left his face and the shadows receded further into his eyes.

On Christmas morning I felt a sharp poke in my ribs, but I just grumbled and turned over, trying to ignore it. Pain flared again as I felt another poke and this time I was bounced into sliding my eyes open. Harry was leaning over me, eagerly waiting for me to wake up.

'Ginny get up, it's Christmas! I have something for you.' Harry's voice was both eager and uncharacteristically shy, making me sit upright to look him in the eye. His hair was sticking up in all directions and his scar was vivid against the pale skin of his forehead. His whole body was tensed with a vibrant energy. I had an urge to reach out and smooth down his hair but he jumped off the bed before I got the chance, obviously too restless to stay still any longer. Instead I ran my fingers through my own hair, grimacing as they snagged on various knots. I combed it with my fingers as well as I could then started to climb off the bed.

'No, don't get up.' There was amusement in Harry's voice as he came back into his bedroom.

'Harry, you just got through wanting me to get up and now you don't want me to?'

'I meant wake up ... it's too cold to get up.' He was right; our breath was misting in the air and goosebumps were pebbling on Harry's bare arms. 'Stay there.' There was command in his voice and I recognised the tone he used with the newest Auror recruits and smiled, happy that he was regaining his confidence in his abilities even if I was less than thrilled that he was treating me as one of his underlings. His eyes were intense as he stared at me and I held my hand out to him. He climbed back onto the bed and gave me a kiss. His lips were chill on mine and I shivered and pulled the blankets closer around the two of us.

Harry passed over a small wrapped box and said, 'I didn't want to do this in front of George, I just know he'd say something and ruin it,' he said. 'Also, I think your mum would go nuts and neither one of them is a reaction I want ...'

'You're babbling, Harry,' I said, rolling my eyes as I thought about Mum. She had been very quiet on the wedding plan front but I could feel the tension bubbling under her smooth surface and I knew it was a matter of time before she blew into huge preparations again. I still had Hermione on red alert to forestall any of her more outlandish ideas, so I turned my attention back to the box in front of me.

I opened it with shaking fingers, not sure if that was from the intensity I was feeling from Harry or from the cold. Inside was a heavy gold band on cream silk. Three tiny diamonds were nestled across the top of the band. The ring was weighted down with age, glimmering rather than sparkling as new jewellery does. I felt tears prickling in my eyes as I stared at it.

'It was my mother's,' Harry said in a voice that cracked as he spoke. 'I thought you might want to use it when we get married.'

I turned to him and pulled him close. I could feel the beat of his heart against my chest and a lump rose in my throat. 'Of course I will,' I said. 'But ... how did you get it? Your mother ...' I broke off, unsure how to say what I needed to say.

Harry hugged me back and said, 'Sirius.' I pulled back and looked at him in shock. 'It was in his vault,' Harry clarified. 'I think she might have given it to him to keep it safe, before ... well, you know ...'

I gave him another hug and he kissed me. Before things got too interesting I pulled away and _accio_ed Harry's gift over to us.

'See, Harry, this is how you get presents and avoid getting out of a warm bed,' I teased him as it zoomed into my hand.

'Very funny. Unless you've learned how to use _accio_ through closed doors I kind of had to get up.' His voice was light as he said it and I giggled and snuggled further into the blankets' warmth.

'Here.' I held out the slim package to him, suddenly shy. 'It's nothing like you gave me, but I hope you like it.'

'It's from you; it's impossible not to like anything you do.' I caught the teasing light in his eyes and poked him hard in the ribs.

'I bet you liked that too, huh?'

In reply, he grabbed my hands with his Auror's reflexes and I ended up pinned under him with my hands inconveniently held by my side by his legs. He grinned at me as he rolled off and quickly opened the gift I had given him. I watched him, feeling anxious as I did so, because I wasn't sure how he would take it. His eyes widened as he saw the photos spill out onto the bed.

'Where did you get these?' he asked as he ran one finger over a picture of Sirius laughing at the kitchen table in Grimauld Place. To my relief his expression was pensive and reminiscent but not sad and his voice was surprisingly normal.

'I found them in Mum and Dad's attic when I was looking for the table decorations last week. Mum agreed it was only right that you have them.'

He picked up another picture, this one of a radiant Tonks, cuddling Teddy and smiling adoringly up at a stunned-looking Lupin.

'They're wonderful,' he said, finally looking at me. 'I only had the one of Sirius from my parents' wedding and the one Moody gave me.' He touched a picture of Moody looking grim even while Sirius poured him a cup of mead. Sirius seemed to be having a good time and had quite possibly already had one or two meads himself judging by the unsteadiness with which he poured the drink. Looking at it Harry laughed a little. 'It's good to remember that Sirius was happy some of the time that year. Thank you,' he said as he glanced at me again.

I reached over and squeezed his hand and he kissed me. It felt good to be with a Harry who could remember the good times and smile and laugh a little rather than the morose one I'd been living with up til now and I took full advantage of his good mood.

We took our time having breakfast and getting dressed, not willing to leave our little pocket of peace just yet for the chaos at the Burrow. It felt weird not being part of the early morning mayhem of my old home, but I realised I didn't miss it; being with Harry was all I needed. He already felt like family to me and the thought made me smile and hug him close as we sat on the couch together. I heard a panicked clearing of the throat nearby and looked up to see Ron looking stressed and Hermione grinning at us.

'Finally decided to get up, did you?' I teased as Hermione came over and sat down on the other couch and Ron headed for the kitchen.

'It was just nice to not have to get up,' she said, curling her feet up under her. 'I think I even went back to sleep for a while.'

'I know you're going to your parents' place first,' I said anxiously. 'But you are coming to the Burrow later, right?'

'Definitely,' she said. 'Why are you so worried about it?'

'Because I get the feeling that Mum will start the big wedding planning binge as soon as dinner is cleared off the table, and I need your backup.' Harry blanched beside me, but Hermione just giggled and nodded understanding.

Soon after, I dragged Harry to the floo as Hermione and Ron got ready to take the Muggle train to her parents' house.

All was intoxicating chaos when we arrived at home. George immediately grabbed Harry and dragged him off to do some sort of bloke ritual in the yard while I greeted Mum and Dad. Mum had already prepared the dinner and was shooing people out of the kitchen because she refused any help. She was a lot better now, too, I noticed as I looked at her carefully. The gaunt look she had worn immediately after the battle and that kept reappearing at big family occasions wasn't on her face today.

In fact, as I looked around I noticed that everyone was looking a lot more like the people they had been before the war had cut our lives in two. It seemed that while I had been busy with Harry's issues the rest of us had managed to move on. No, that was wrong. I had been too involved in all the other things in my life, like school, quidditch and of course Harry, to really notice that the others had survived as well. More than survived; it looked like we were thriving. Even George, as he came through the door with Harry and a bunch of enchanted snowballs, looked the way he used to, cracking jokes and taking a spot in the limelight. I felt a pang as I half expected Fred to follow him, but it wasn't the devastating pang of the past. This was more like reminiscing than melancholy and I smiled as I watched George and Harry drop the snowballs around Percy's head.

I felt a gentle hand on my shoulder and turned to see Dad standing behind me.

'It feels good today, doesn't it?' he said as if he could read my mind. I nodded.

'I feel like maybe we're almost healed, Dad. It took a while, but ... everyone looks so happy.'

'They do,' he said and smiled. 'Did you see the new carburanetter Hermione gave me for my car, Ginny?' He drew me off towards the lounge where it sat in pride of place on the coffee table. 'Look, it's so small. Amazing to think Muggles make these things go without magic ...'

I smiled as I listened to him. His passion for Muggle objects was undimmed and I knew it wouldn't be long before Mum had another enchanted car to worry about. Thankfully, we were all too old to get into too much trouble flying it anywhere. I cast a look at George. Well, most of us were too old.

Christmas lunch was a loud affair. Mum had gathered everybody she could into the fold, so as well as Harry, me, George, Charlie, Percy and Dad, she also had Andromeda and Teddy, who was a noise machine himself, and Luna and her father. I found myself sitting between Harry and Luna and we had a very interesting, if somewhat weird, discussion of the rainforest she had been studying to find the rare magical creatures she was convinced lived there.

'Yes, Rolf found traces of the snorcacks's trail but they were long gone from the area. Poor things must have been scared off by the weird distorted vibrations from the nearby city...'

'Rolf?' I asked, my interest piqued. 'Who's Rolf?'

'Oh? Didn't I tell you? Rolf Scamander. He's my guide in South America. His father wrote a book I think ... something about plants.' She looked dreamily away into the distance and I gaped at her. Luna looked positively in love when she talked about this guy. I was going to say something to her but just then George stood up to propose a toast. Harry took my hand and I smiled at him, remembering Christmas dinner two years ago when he was away hunting his horcruxes and I was sick with worry for him.

'I just want to propose a toast,' said George, 'to those who can't be with us here. Wherever they are, I sure hope they're having as much fun as we are, watching us sharing time together, time that they fought for us to have.' He raised his glass of butterbeer. 'Thanks guys, we appreciate it.'

Mum's eyes were bright, but she was smiling as she raised her glass too and we all drank. It was nice. Unfortunately, my prediction was all too correct. When everyone had eaten their fill of Mum's excellent dessert, she pushed back from the table and directed George, Percy, Luna and Charlie to clear the table down and fixed her eyes on me and Harry.

'Now, I know you two feel you have plenty of time to get this wedding sorted out, but it will slip away from you if you let it ...'

I rolled my eyes. 'Mum, we're fine. It's all under control.'

'But you haven't thought about flowers, or the marquee, or ...'

'It's Christmas. Do we need to think about it right now?'

I was frantically trying to find a way to stall her until Hermione got there, so in the end I let Mum speak. She had grandiose plans for a huge marquee and magically enhanced rows of chairs for everyone she expected to turn up. She was probably right, Harry being who he was. I shuddered internally but allowed her to talk, figuring I would get Hermione to help me think of ways to tone Mum down. There was no way Harry was going to deal very well with the monstrosities Mum was trying to organise. Out of the corner of my eye I could see him getting more and more tense as she spoke. I pressed my foot against his to let him know I understood.

'And of course you'll need a guest list. Arthur talked to Kingsley already and he has had a huge amount of interest from various people ...'

I glared at Dad, who had the grace to look ashamed. Mum was still carrying on, and I felt I needed to stop her in her tracks on this one.

'Mum. We're not inviting a whole bunch of people we don't know.'

'But, Harry is ...'

'No.' For the first time Harry spoke up. 'I'm not inviting people to a state wedding, Mrs Weasley. I'll do pretty much anything else you want.' That made me cringe and he turned to grin at me before turning back to Mum. 'But the one thing I won't do is turn this into a circus for people like Rita Skeeter to pick over. Ginny and I want it to be as small as we can make it.'

Mum stared at him for a moment, then nodded slowly. 'I understand,' she said. I looked at her in shock. How was it that Harry could just say what he wanted and she caved? She caught my look and added, 'I saw how it affected you two when they wrote all those things about you the last two years. I didn't think about the way it would affect you if they had access to your wedding.' She took a deep breath and said, 'no. The guest list I will leave to you, barring one or two cousins who really need to come.'

I stood up and came around the table to give her a hug.

'Thanks, Mum. I'm not trying to be difficult, really. I just ... we just want it to be about us. And it is Christmas today, so let's just forget about it for a while and have some fun.'

I got Mum off the track of the wedding and into the lounge to listen to the annual Celestina Warbeck concert. That meant that when Hermione arrived with Ron I was able to shake my head in response to her raised eyebrows. She smiled at me happily and we all settled in for a long, laughter-filled evening together around the Christmas tree.


	19. Easter

Chapter Eighteen: Easter

Time began to speed up on me. The months between Christmas and our final quidditch game in July slipped by alarmingly fast. Obviously things happened, and life slipped by in that way it has. I ended up spending quite a bit of time with George because Ron had finally left him to himself in the joke shop and taken up his position training as an Auror. Like Mum, like Harry, like all of us, George still had his moments; moments where all the joy would leach out of his face and he would excuse himself to be alone for a while. They came increasingly less often though and he began to become his old self again.

Easter had always been one of those times when Fred and George would try to pull off 'the prank to end all pranks' as they put it. The rest of the family always tried to stop it and the annual battle to see who would win was epic. Usually they were sneaky enough to manage it but there had been a few times when we had foiled them. The good natured rivalry was one of the things I most looked forward to every Easter and the year after the battle when George hadn't had the heart to do it by himself had been a sad time. The next year, however, I noticed him getting secretive, a different secretive to the morose moping he would do when he was hit by his grief again. He took to slinking off by himself with a hint of his old cheek on his face.

'Harry,' I said one day while he was studying, lying curled on his side on the bed I now thought of as ours. He said a vague 'hm?' in response which made me smile.

'Do you think George is acting weird lately?'

'I dunno. I hadn't noticed.' Harry's voice still sounded abstracted, and I pulled the book away from him.

'You study too much, Potter,' I said as he began to protest, trying to keep it in reading position. 'You don't want to become like Hermione, do you?' I distracted him with a kiss then put the book on the small table he had set up by the bed. He flopped onto his back and smiled at me so I assumed he wasn't too upset about cutting his study short.

'I think George is planning his annual prank and I think we owe him the respect of trying to stop him in his tracks.' I laughed at the look that stole over Harry's face. 'I forgot you'd never been involved. It's a tradition, Harry. The twins plan an Easter prank every year and everyone else tries to figure it out and stop them.'

I bounced a little thinking about it. 'Don't you see, we can't let him get away with it. That would be like a ... like a ... pity pranking or something. No, we have to try and stop him.'

The look Harry gave me was amused resignation but he joined in my plans with reasonable interest. The problem is that George is sneaky and it never pays to underestimate him. Discovering what he was up to wasn't going to be easy. I rubbed my hands together; I was really looking forward to matching wits with my big brother again.

'I think it's the big Sunday dinner he's targeting this year,' I said to Bill over the floo one day. 'He has this look when he's in the kitchen. You know the one.'

Bill's head in the fireplace nodded, but he gave me a word of caution. 'Don't let him double-blind you, sis. You know he could be covering his real plan by making you think it's the dinner.'

I thought for a few moments, remembering the way George had been acting. 'You're right, and I'll keep an eye out, but he always has a good reason for being in the kitchen. Surely if it was his blind he'd, you know, sometimes _not_ have a valid excuse for being there?'

Bill conceded the point, but still warned me to be on my guard. That was only sensible when one of George's pranks was involved, so I nodded and kept a close eye on George whenever I could.

Since I was only very technically living at home anymore it was hard to keep a proper eye on him. Mum and Dad were very little help either. It had always been a thing between us kids and they had tended to keep an eye out only to be sure that none of us ended with a hexed-off body part. They tried hard to help me that year, but Dad was away at work so much and Mum was in such full-blown plans for the family dinner (not to mention her lists of wedding plans), that they didn't have much time to help me out.

I wasn't much better. With the intense quidditch practices that Gwenog was putting us through in the lead up to the final game against Portree, and the time I wanted to spend with Harry, I was hardly at the Burrow. About three days before Easter, however, Harry and the other new Aurors were sent on an overnight mission. He was tense and worried about it since this was his first real mission since that night at Malfoy's place, but he seemed cheerful enough when I saw him off. I decided that since Harry was away for the night I'd pop over and see Mum and Dad (and coincidentally George, who was spending that week with them – another indication that he was up to something). That it also got me away from Ron and Hermione's increasingly public shows of affection was an added bonus.

George was in the lounge when I got there, folding a massive pile of washing for Mum.

'Lover boy gone, then?' he smirked at me. 'These days that's the only time we see you.'

'Bit rich coming from you, isn't it? You're always at the shop or attached to Angelina's face.'

'I spend time at the shop to give Mum and Dad some alone time,' he declared with a twinkle in his eye.

'Uh-huh, sure. Your motives are as pure as the driven snow, I'm sure.'

George laughed and went back to the washing pile. I pulled out my wand and helped him with the staggering amount. It seemed that Mum had pulled out every piece of winter clothing left in the house and washed it before she put it away for spring and summer.

'It's a bit early to be putting this all away, isn't it? It's still not very warm out,' I said as I carefully selected the heavy winter robes and folded them before wafted them to the waiting stack on the nearest chair.

'Yep, but you know the woman.' George mimicked Mum's voice. 'It all needs a good freshening and you all need to wear your Christmas jumpers one last time before we put them away.' He grinned at my expression. 'We're going to be a right sight to see, aren't we?' I shuddered and agreed, knowing that Mum would get her way and we would all wear the jumpers because, again, it was tradition.

That evening at dinner I watched George closely. His eyes danced a little as he scanned the kitchen, but overall he had a very normal attitude, which immediately raised my suspicions even more. When he offered to do the dishes that night – alone – I knew I had him. I insisted on helping him with them and the faint hint of irritation that flashed across his face made me smile.

While we were in the kitchen George was very careful to be his usual self. He joked with me, whisked dishes out from under my nose, teased me about Harry ... but he carefully kept my attention away from one particular cupboard. He was good, I'll give him that. His eyes never flickered in that direction, but he always managed to get the dishes that went in there and he never allowed me to see inside when he wafted them in.

Later that night, I snuck down the stairs to examine that cupboard. I found traces of a powder over those plates. I chuckled to myself. Poor George tried hard but he just didn't have his old knack back yet. I carefully washed off the powder and replaced it with harmless icing sugar. George would check in the morning but nothing would be amiss. He had no need to know that I'd changed the powder for him. Smirking I went up to bed again looking forward to the day when George's big plan came unravelled.

Two days later thunderous banging pulled me from my sleep and I squinted at the door.

'I always prefer doing this when Harry's here too, much more spicy,' said George, grinning at me. 'But that dopey look on your face is almost as much fun.'

I groaned and shoved my head under the pillow again, trying to forget that Harry had been kept away for an extra two nights on his mission.

'None of that,' said George, and my blankets floated off me and tumbled onto the floor. 'It's time to get up. Mum wants to be sure your jumper still fits, so you're wanted in the kitchen.' The grin he gave me as he left the room was positively cocky and I laughed internally. It wouldn't be long before he wasn't feeling so on top of the world. Suddenly feeling a lot more awake, I got up and got dressed.

The jumper Mum expected me to wear, a vivid blue one with snitches around the bottom, unfortunately fitted me just fine. As I got to the bottom of the stairs, still scrubbing my face with my hands to wake myself up fully, I saw a whole sea of similar jumpers. In the middle of them was a bright emerald green, topped by a mop of black hair.

'Harry!' I shrieked and he turned. I threw myself at him and he gave me a fierce hug.

'Damn, she's looking good, even in that colour,' a tiny voice squealed in my ear. I pulled back and looked at Harry in consternation.

'What did you say, Harry?' His face was fiery red as he looked at me, and he shook his head.

'I didn't say anything ... the jumper did.'

I looked down, then back up at him. I took in the look on his face and whispered, 'but you were thinking it, weren't you?' He couldn't quite meet my eye and suddenly another tiny voice spoke up. 'He looks so cute when he squirms.'

I blushed as Harry looked at me. As I pulled away from him I noticed that his thought, as well as having been spoke aloud, had appeared on the front of his jumper. From the way he was gaping at my chest, the same thing had happened to me. 'What's going on, Harry?' I whispered. 'This isn't normal ... oh! George! Oh, he's going to pay ...' I spun around, ready to give George a piece of my mind only to see that all of the jumpers on the people in front of me were sporting comments.

'Oh, Merlin. This is so going to be bad,' the tiny voice squeaked out again and I looked down to see the words replacing my previous thought on my jumper.

'George!' I shouted, storming over to him. 'Okay, you did it, you had your fun, you've fooled us all. Now ... turn it off.' I glared at him, hands on my hips. Everyone stopped chattering and watched us. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Bill stifling a snicker. I really shouldn't have gloated to him about foiling George's plan.

'I really shouldn't have gloated to him about foiling George's plan,' the voice squeaked again and I blushed as George grinned at me.

'You are far too trusting of your eyes, little sis. You should work on that. Powder on the dishes? You really thought I'd lost my touch to that extent?' His eyes were alight as he looked at me. 'And I'm afraid that I can't turn it off. The effects will last for twelve hours.' I gaped at him as the meaning of that sank in. 'Best to try and stop thinking rude thoughts, hey, Ginny?'

'You bloody prat!' The tiny voice shrieked in my ear and George laughed again as he turned away. I noticed that his jumper, and Angelina's, weren't sporting any messages.

Around us a babbling started up so no-one could hear the voices announcing their owners' thoughts, but the constant flux of thoughts across everyone's chests didn't let up. I stared at George in fury until Harry grabbed my hand and pulled me away. He took me outside and the brisk air made me calm down a little. He slid his arms around me and I buried my face in his shoulder.

'What are we going to do?' I mumbled. 'I can't stop thinking about you, and I sure as hell don't want my parents reading every thought that flickers through my head while you're with me.'

'Can't we just take it off? Put it in a corner where it won't spout everything we say?' There was suppressed amusement in Harry's voice and it helped me to see the funnier side of it.

To test the idea I tugged on his jumper, but while I could get my hands underneath it, it refused to slide over his head. The same thing happened when he tried it on mine. I stamped my foot, frustrated. 'Bloody George. Bloody pranks ...'

'She's so cute when she's angry,' Harry's jumper said, and I stilled, staring at him while turning something over in my mind. He shuffled his feet in embarrassment.

'Harry, have you noticed that the jumpers only speak up when we think something mean or ... or attraction-related. What did George say? Stop thinking rude thoughts? Maybe that's what he meant.'

Harry's breath huffed out as he sighed and he wrapped his arms around me again. 'Maybe. For example, if I were to think ...'

'I've wanted to kiss her since I saw her this morning,' the tinny voice chirped in my ear as Harry suited action to words. I stifled a giggle as I kissed him back.

'Now all we have to do is think one mean thought each and be really careful for the rest of the day. Shall we question George's manliness maybe?'

'George is an incompetent idiot,' said Harry's jumper in smug tones. I laughed and raised my eyebrows.

'Couldn't come up with something better than that?' I asked. Harry just said, 'I don't want to antagonise him too much. Who knows what else he'd come up with.'

'George is a useless bloody prat who likes to play with gnomes,' My jumper said helpfully.

Laughing, Harry smirked at me. 'Yours wasn't any better than mine,' he said as he put his arm around me and led me back into the house.

'I know, but it's hard to come up with something on demand. Now ... just don't think about each other for the rest of the day, right?' I giggled as we got to the kitchen again. 'How hard can that be?'

The rest of the day was agony as I tried not to think of Harry. I tried not to think that it had been three days since I saw him, I tried not to notice the way my body warmed as he sat next to me at dinner, I tried not to notice the way his hand mussed his hair the way he always did when he was nervous. I messed up a couple of times, though, the most embarrassing of which was during dinner when Harry's foot bumped mine and I jerked away from him in an attempt to keep my thoughts to myself. He moved, too, and I caught a sudden scent of his musk mixed with an earthy smell and my jumper squeaked out, 'three days apart has been too long; I can't wait to get home.'

Unfortunately it happened during a lull in conversation. Mum's eyebrows shot up as high as they could go and I could feel a blush rising in my cheeks. George chocked back a laugh as I glared at him and the others tried to cover with babbled conversation.

'This is your home, Ginny. You've said so many times yourself.' Mum's voice sounded hurt and it was all I could do to not insult George in my head. I reached across the table and squeezed her hand.

'I know, Mum. But, you know what I mean. I want to get this bloody jumper off or be somewhere that it doesn't matter if I speak my mind.'

Astonishingly, she grinned at me. 'Yes, dear, I agree. I don't really need this sort of insight into your thoughts. It was bad enough hearing what Bill was thinking this morning ...'

She looked down the table towards the spot where Bill and Fleur whispered together, and smiled at them. 'Apparently they're trying for another baby, and that is _all_ he thinks about. Thank goodness Fleur is more circumspect.'

I blanched as I thought about it, my hands raising to my ears trying to block the sound out. 'If you don't mind, Mum, I think Harry and I might leave earlier than normal. It's taking all my efforts not to abuse George with every thought I have.'

'I'd like to wring his neck, too,' her jumper squeaked, and I giggled as she frowned down the table towards George, who still looked smug.

'It's good to see him so happy again, though, isn't it?' I said. 'I mean, he's a massive pain for doing this, but it's nice to have him back.'

Mum smiled at me and agreed, and the rest of the dinner passed in relative peace with very few jumpers interrupting the flow of our conversation again.

One thing I told myself, as Harry and I apparated away along with Ron and Hermione, was that I was going to get George back somehow. I didn't know how and I didn't know when, but I couldn't let this one pass. In the meantime, Gwenog picked up the pace of our practices even more as the big game loomed. There was a lot riding on this one, not least of which was a starting position for next season, so I threw myself into the practices and pushed George to the back of my mind. He could wait.


End file.
